Just back from a soil biology training session with one of the country's leading experts, Paul Wagner, at the Soil Food Web on Long Island, I remain in awe of the world's smallest creatures. These are the bacteria, protozoa, nematodes etc. that make our life on the planet possible. Healthy soil, ironically, can probably best be described as a war zone. Everything down there is eating everything else. And wh ...

Ag Company Offers NatraTurf products, Ideal for Homeowners' Fall Application GILMORE CITY, Iowa — If you had mostly dandelions on your lawn last spring, it’s probably because your soil wanted to grow dandelions and not grass. The so-called weeds, in other words, were messengers sent by Mother Nature to tell property owners something about life below ground. It was that common belief — that lawns and gardens ...

[caption id="attachment_4234" align="alignleft" width="420" caption="From the book, The Organic Lawn Care Manual (Storey, 2007)"][/caption] More than a few SafeLawns followers and media members have called and emailed today about what to do with lawns after such a huge deluge of water along the East Coast. And a few other friends from Texas emailed to say, "Send the rain this way!" The good news is that law ...

Anyone feel the earthquake today? Wow! It was my first earthquake experience in my 50-plus years and, for 30 seconds or so, the world literally seemed to be twisting and turning. I'm guessing it will be one of those "do-you-remember-where-you-were-when" moments. I happened to be at Glenstone, the modern art museum in Potomac, Md., where the grounds staff and management began working with SafeLawns 13 months ...

Actinovate Can Suppress the Worst Lawn Problems Lawns are naturally waving their brown flags these days in the face of record heat in many parts of the country. "Cool-season" grasses — fescues, ryegrasses, bentgrasses and bluegrasses — just don't like it one bit when the thermometer stays consistently above 90 degrees Fahrenheit. [caption id="attachment_3928" align="alignleft" width="288" caption="Dollar sp ...

[caption id="attachment_3636" align="alignleft" width="540" caption="Slugs love the moist conditions currently in play in many regions of the nation."][/caption] While our colleagues in Houston and elsewhere are reporting a drought of epic proportions, the near constant rain and high humidity on the Eastern seaboard has brought an onslaught of questions about slugs. Here's a great post to review: http://www ...

[caption id="attachment_3610" align="alignleft" width="533" caption="Set the mower to its highest setting this time of year on most grass species (except Bermuda, bentgrass or Seashore paspalum)."][/caption] Here is a slightly humorous, somewhat agonizing letter pulled from the SafeLawns mail bag: “Someone in the family (I won’t say who) cut our combination new and old lawn with a very dull blade (electric ...

May 23, 2011 BLR Green Team: Creating a Sustainable Workplace at BLR Are You Falling Into The "More-On" Approach? by Amanda Czepiel I attended the NEIWPCC conference in Saratoga Springs, New York, last week. Although I have known of the dangers and environmental effects of pesticide use on lawns for years, the keynote speaker, Paul Tukey, really drove the message home loud and clear: Lawn chemicals are most ...

Home remedies ineffective on moles, voles: Ask the Ground Crew Published: Wednesday, May 25, 2011, 3:27 PM Over the winter, moles established twisting trails in our front lawn. How do I get rid of the moles? What do I do about the mole trails ? -- Bob House, Avon For the past two winters, some kind of burrowing mouse/mole/vole makes tunnels under the snow and feasts on my phlox. They live in holes in the gr ...

Starting today, the dying Chesapeake Bay is getting some help. Gov. Martin O'Malley signed into law legislation that limits both the content and the application of fertilizer for urban and suburban lawns, an effort supporters say should help rescue the nutrient-polluted Bay area. The law bars any phosphorus in any fertilizer except those meant to boost growth of new or repaired lawns. It also limits nitroge ...