Now is the Perfect Time to Have Your Soil Tested!!!

The pH of your soil is crucial to the health of your lawn, and weed control. Some weeds thrive in acidic soils, and a balanced pH will allow the soil to release more nutrients to the grass. Now that summer is coming to an end and fall is approaching, we need to start thinking about doing a soil test in your lawn. A soil test tells us the pH of your lawn. It also lets us know the levels of phosphorus and potassium. We use this information to determine if you need more lime which will bring the pH up or if we need to change our fertility program.

In my experience, it is best to add additional lime when the pH is below 6. If that is the case and you choose to purchase additional lime, our goal will be to raise it 1 full point. So, if the pH is 5.5 we would want to add enough lime to get it up to 6.5.

When we apply fertilizer to your lawn, it lowers the pH slightly each time because Nitrogen has a high salt content. So, during our last treatment of the year we put down a maintenance dose of lime which is enough to bring it back up from the fertilizer we put down in the summer. We don’t apply more than that because not everyone needs the pH to come up higher than where it started. If you get it too high, it’s just as bad as it being too low.

Let us know if you would like a soil test done on your lawn this year.

Stay Weed-Free!

Steve Clark