Gardening @Home
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Lawn Repair and Preparation Tips
Damaged Area
Preparing the Soil for New Grass: From Bayer Advanced
Whether you use sod or seed, it is important to prepare
your planting area in advance. Following are some simple
pre-planting steps that will help you create a beautiful lawn.
1.Remove weeds from the planting area
2.Till the area to break up dead grass and compacted soil
3.Work in any needed lime or organic matter as you till
4.Use a steel rake to remove any dead grass or stones from the planting area
5.Smooth the planting area so that it is even
6.When installing the lawn, use a roller to settle the loosened soil
7.After the soil is prepared, plant the seed or sod More.....
Some Practical Advice
We need to repair that lawn damage today so we're
off to the nursery. Will be back later with step by step advice.
gf
.
Lawn Repair and Preparation Tips
Damaged Area
Preparing the Soil for New Grass: From Bayer Advanced
Whether you use sod or seed, it is important to prepare
your planting area in advance. Following are some simple
pre-planting steps that will help you create a beautiful lawn.
1.Remove weeds from the planting area
2.Till the area to break up dead grass and compacted soil
3.Work in any needed lime or organic matter as you till
4.Use a steel rake to remove any dead grass or stones from the planting area
5.Smooth the planting area so that it is even
6.When installing the lawn, use a roller to settle the loosened soil
7.After the soil is prepared, plant the seed or sod More.....
Some Practical Advice
We need to repair that lawn damage today so we're
off to the nursery. Will be back later with step by step advice.
gf
.
posted by gf at 3:19 AM
6 Comments:
Hmm, your "solution" leaves some things out, I think. Okay, so what we have is some people who want to have plants be unpeed-upon, and others who have dogs that need to pee. The "problem" as I see it is not a horticultural one. If the dogs stop peeing in a particular place, time alone (along with natural water flow and plant growth) will restore the prior condition.
The problem is the negotiation between plant owners and pet owners. Can dog owners use the tree lawn as a dog toilet? Can plant owners treat the tree lawn as private space? Are the signals clear now? Should changes be made? I think these are the tough questions that are currently unanswered, and lead to the conflicts you mention.
My own experience growing up in a single-family neighborhood with big lawns was the more time people spent manicuring their lawns, the more they hated children. Conversely, the more dogs people had, the more they welcomed children. It is no accident that today I have dogs, am a father, and have no lawn. But I'm not against gardening, per se. More than anything, I'm opposed to people enforcing rules that don't really exist.
Are the people who want a manicured treelawn going to help clean up all the ones that are littered with trash? Are you going to get rid of all the impaling dangers that those rusty pipes threaten our children and elderly with? I mean, if the treelawn is the next zone of enforcement, let's do it right.
What are the rules, exactly?
hey tom-
thanx fo commenting.
the horticulture advice is only a practical solution to the damage after the fact, not really an attempt to solve the issue.
you are partially correct, in my view when you said, "The problem is the negotiation between plant owners and pet owners" because parkways or tree lawns fall into a "grey" area with regard to ownership, maintenance and what we are currently allowed to do with the space. as i understand it, we as property owners do not "own" the parkway space but we are expected, at least from a civic pride perspective, to maintain it.
as i said in the opinion piece, so many property owners now are integrating the parkway space into their garden design and in doing this, they visually "extend" their property but they also "extend" a defacto ownership which is where some of the issues arise.
many property owners have spent lots of money planting, building walls and gates around these spaces and the city is turning a blind eye to this trend for some reason. currently, we are not required to get a permit for the work even though it's technically city property and can be torn up anytime utility work needs to be done with no recourse. As an observation, it does seem odd to me in a city with ever expanding legislation about what we can and cannot do, that this trend seems to have slipped through the cracks. i’m not hoping for that dreaded legislation, as I said it just seems odd.
if you visit the gold coast, parkways along entire blocks are gated, walled or planted sometimes so close to the curb that a passenger can’t open the car door. Or the gates are constructed along an entire 30 or 40 feet of parkway space with no pass through. This doesn’t really impact us the same way in my neighborhood and I appreciate the beautification efforts and support dog owners too.
My complaint is with the dog owners who let their pets wander on front lawns and gardens and I see it all the time. I don’t think we can complain very much about the parkway spaces as long as people clean up after their dog. I think it boils down to some simple education and a little common courtesy.
i also grew up with some of those love my lawn / hate you kids owners and of course the more they complained, the more we had to run on thier grass. funny how that works.
btw and i apologize for making this post so long but "If the dogs stop peeing in a particular place, time alone (along with natural water flow and plant growth) will restore the prior condition." is a common misconception. that's why i linked the repair advice to the opinion piece. when dogs urinate repeatedly on grass or some plants as they usually do, there is no "natural restoration". the damage is permanant.
Hmm. "Permanent" is a long time. As I understand it, when the Romans salted the fields of Carthage, it left them barren for ten years. A long time to be without food, but not permanent. If it were permanent, those lands should still be barren.
Spraying an area with DDT, which does seem to be permanent, doesn't permanently affect the area. DDT dissipates into the surrounding environment. The DDT is permanent, but the placement of it is not.
Are you saying dog pee is somehow more "permanent" than salt and DDT?
One lawnlover from my childhood chased a kid with an axe handle because a basketball rolled into his lawn. We salted his lawn for that. It was summer, and everyone's dad had a little extra rock salt left in the garage. He's lucky we didn't write something obscene. He put sod down, but the salt crept through the roots and killed it. Finally, he tilled the whole thing and replanted the following spring, which did the trick. I doubt he ever knew what hit him, but it gave us pleasure to see him work.
So, I take it you're opposed to those signs in the tree lawn that threaten us with death, "LAWN TREATED WITH POISON: KEEP DOGS OFF." I've seen several that are permanently attached, making me wonder how often these people go out to spread their poison (yeah, right). Now that I think of it, I should place a sign right under those: "POISON COUNTERACTED BY SALT: RIGHT BACK ATCHA."
Seriously, Gary, dog owners have so many people coming after us with this complaint and that one that it becomes hard to hear anything in the din. Yesterday, one family complained because I was walking my dogs, and another woman complained because my son was walking one dog and I was walking the other. This is all on-leash activity. Now it's NIMFY. Where are dogs supposed to pee, and how are people supposed to know?
What are the rules? I mean, I'll tell you what I think the rules are/should be: All tree lawns are fair game, except those built into raised beds, the side of which the dogs can still pee on. Raised bed tree lawns need to be spectacularly gorgeous and immaculate to justify removing them from public use. Owners who fence in a tree lawn without the attendant improvement will be strapped to the ground for the dogs to pee and shit on. Owners who leave impalement risks are to be impaled on their own poles. Owners of front lawns that don't want pee on them should build a fence. Dog owners who don't pick up their dog's messes have to wear the mess on their heads for the rest of the day.
Seriously, though, leaving aside the fact that neither you nor I can actually put these rules in place, what do you think the rules should be? What constitutes considerate and responsible behavior?
tom-
well, as long as the tree lawn does not belong to the property owner, under the law it is "fair game" for dogs. having said that, appreciating the beautification and understanding the potential disruption and damage, my personal solution is to find the tree lawn on the block that is NOT cared for. luckily, we have a few.
"LAWN TREATED WITH POISON: KEEP DOGS OFF."
i have seen those signs too and this is the defacto ownership i was referring to. very un neighborly and i wonder how legal it is to apply poison on public property? some research might be in order.
tom, i really don't think front lawns and gardens are fair game for our dogs, whether we pick up the mess or not. it seems rude to me. besides, it's private property and owners have a reasonable expectation that the time and money they spent on their property will be respected. i think that's a fair expectation. most people wouldn't allow their dog to make a mess on someone's porch and in my view, a front lawn or garden is no different.
as for the peramanancy....until repaired or removed.when a plant dies, it's kinda' permanant.oh, and the rock salt....probably a close second to urine for damaging plants.
and finally,i would support this legislatively,
"Dog owners who don't pick up their dog's messes have to wear the mess on their heads for the rest of the day." ;)
and lastly, at least we have tree lawns in chicago. new york does not. it's brutal.
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