My Grass Is Slim So How Do I Thicken the Grass?

Proper lawn maintenance is often the key to thick, lush grass. Improving your lawn watering and fertilizing schedules can thicken your property’s thin grass, and dethatching or aerating it may help, too. If the bud is very thin, then overseed it to provide fresh grass and fill bare patches. The best time for overseeding is fall, when cool, moist weather promotes the resulting young grass to establish itself fast.

Watering Your Lawn

Infrequent, deep watering promotes grass to grow thickly. It is possible to check how deep water penetrates the ground by waiting a couple of hours after watering, permitting the water to soak in, and then forcing a screwdriver or trowel about 8 inches deep in the ground. Pull the screwdriver or trowel from the ground, and check whether or not soil clings along the program’s length. If the close of the instrument is dry, then the lawn requires more water. Water your lawn until the ground is moist to 6 to 8 inches deep, and wait until the top two to three inches of soil is dry before watering your lawn.

Applying Fertilizer

Grass grows thickly when given fertilizer on a regular basis. When you mow your lawn, leave the grass clippings on its surface. Grass clippings supply up to 30 percent of a lawn’s fertilizer needs. Employ a slow-release, natural, granular fertilizer — such as a dry, 11-2-2, organic merchandise — to feed the grass and the microbial life in the ground. Healthy soil helps grass grow well. Expand the fertilizer at a rate of 7 1/3 pounds per 1,000 square feet, or apply it according to its manufacturer’s instructions. Various kinds of grass have different fertilizer requirements, but most grasses gain from a fertilizer application three or even four times each year. Take care not to overfertilize. Too much nitrogen — that is part of fertilizer — is bad for grass, and fertilizer runoff from lawns pollutes ground water.

Dethatching and Aerating

Dethatching and aerating improve the growing conditions for grass. Thatch is lifeless grass, moss and other plant debris that gathers on lawn surfaces. Thatch thicker than 1/2 inch prevents water from penetrating and discourages strong grass development. Remove thatch from your lawn with a dethatcher, which drags upright tines through the grass, removing all of the debris. Hard, compacted soil also causes bud to grow badly, but running an aerator above a lawn relieves compaction. The aerator removes plugs of soil. Leave the soil plugs on the lawn so that they are naturally absorbed. Dethatching a lawn each spring and aerating it every three or four years promotes healthy bud growth.

Overseeding the Yard

Overseeding a healthful but slender lawn supplies new, new grass growth. The right number of seeds to sow is dependent upon the bud variety. As an example, perennial ryegrass (Lolium perenne), that is hardy at U.S. Department of Agriculture plant hardiness zones 3 through 9, is sown at a rate of 6 to 8 pounds of seeds per 1,000 square feet, but other kinds of grasses have been sown at higher or lower rates. Dethatch or rake the lawn vigorously to prepare it for sowing, and divide the grass seed into two parts. Sow 1 portion up and down the lawn and another portion of side to side so that the seeds cover the lawn evenly. On bare patches, the seeds should be sown two to three times more thickly than in other locations. Water the lawn using a garden hose with a soft spray attachment, and water it when the soil surface dries out until the grass grows strongly.

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