LAWN RENOVATIONS

Hawke's Bay Herald-Tribune, Issue 64, 2 April 1937, Page 12

LAWN RENOVATIONS

If inciined to be mossy; Dress with weathered soot until the grass has a deflnite blackish tinge. If Ihe soot is applied just before a shower, it will not long remain unsiglitly, being waslied out of sight in a few days. If very mossy: Dress with the lollowing: Sand 141b.; sulp,hate of iron ^lb,, this amount being suflicient for one rod of lawn. A week later rake out the dead moss with a short-toothed rake, scarifying the surface thoroughly. If inciined to be wet or if the soil is sour: Bress with fresh slaked lime at the rate of 11b. per square yard. A week later plunge a garden fork into the turf to its full depth all over the lawn. This is an excellent aid to drainage. If rather poor: Dress lightly with sifted compost consisting of good mould, leaf soil and a little rotted manure and doot. A dressing of basic slag at the rate of $lb. to the square yard is also an excellent tonie. Bone meal (2oz. per square yard) and patent lawn manures again are helpful. If somewhat unlevel: Dress with sifted road sweepings, smoothing them down with a straight-edged board so that they fill up hollows. The grass will ,

soon coine through the layer, the lawn very quickly having a normal appearance. Periodical rolling through the autumn and winter is very neeessary, although it may be added that the old idea that it waa- good to roll a lawn until it looked black and distressed is entirely exploded. Much, and heavy, rolling, especially in wet weather, turns the soil hard and sour, and the grass as a result becomes weakened and bad in colour. No gardener should ever roil just after hard rain, or expect the roller to do the work of a careful lawumaker. It is true the roller helps to keep a lawn level when once it h^is been made so, but the roller eanuot do the work of levelling. All little elevations should be reduced by lifting the turf and taking away a little soil, while soil must be put under the grass to iill a hollow. The autumn is by far the best time for weOding a lawn, as all signs of the work will be gone long before it is used again. Unfortunately there is no magic process that will get rid of the weeds on a laivn at little trouble and expen.se; even a lawn, accounting only for daisies and other small fry. Persistent hand weeding is the only real remedy, the shallow rooting subjects being lifted by means of a worn table knife or, better still, one of the speeial daisy grubbers " sold for the purpose, and those too deeply embedded to be removed being killed by dipping a pointed stick in a strong solution of weed killer; one to eight of water is of suflicient strength. Care should be taken to replace the little lumps. of turf too often brought up with the weeds and to flll any small holes with fme soil having a few grass seeds mixed with it.