In The Garden This Week: Some Midsummer Questions

Some recent Gardening and Lawn Questions:

1. Why is my lawn turning brown?
There are several possible reasons for this. The obvious  answer is that it is July and this month and August are the hottest months of the summer. The high heat we experienced in the first 2/3 of July has been baking the roots of the individual grass plants and limiting their ability to absorb water. This happens every year! It is important to understand that this annual phenomenon shows that your lawn is moving toward dormancy, not death! During this high heat, with a balanced watering program combined with normal rain, your lawn should be receiving one to two inches of water each week.

Anothert reason why your lawn may be browning this week is that it is being cut too close. We call that "scalping". Each blade of grass is an individual plant with roots, stem and a blade. It is recommended that you mow your lawn (or have your lawn mowed) at a height of 3" or more. And do not mow it when it is very wet. When the lawn is wet, the wheels of the mower simply collapse the grass and little of it gets mowed. But that 3" is the ideal. Taller grass helps shade the roots of your lawn and protects the grass plant. All mowers, personal or professional, can be set to any height, so have it set at 3".

2. What is that randomly spreading turf that is just showing up in my lawn?
Crabgrass is with us and it always will be. It invades turf, ornamental gardens and vegetable gardens about this time each year. It is everywhere! But, you say: "I used pre-emergent crabgrass control in April. Why did I still get it?" You need to understand that pre-emergent crabgrass control is just that. It need to be put down in about April to keep the crabgrass from emerging. However, a seemingly well-kept industry secret is that many pre-emergent controls only work for about three months. Also the high heat of July and August is just what it likes. You cannot put down pre-emergent control now because it has already emerged. There are some crabgrass controls that you can use now but you have to spray each individual clump, let it die back and pull it out. It re-seeds so easily that we get very frustrated with this annual nuisance.

3. Where are my tomatoes?
June was not a good month for tomatoes: too much rain! Tomatoes, once the plant has begun to flower and set fruit (yes it IS a fruit), likes lots of heat and not a great deal of water, no more than an inch of water each week, whether from rain or watering. An important thing about tomatoes is that they should be watered from the ground. We cannot control the rain splashing on the plant but we should do our best not to water the whole plant when we are watering our garden. And also very important is that all vegetable gardens should be watered before about 10 A.M. This gives the foliage a chance to dry out before the cooler temperatures of the evening and night. Watering later in the day encourages blights, fungi and other diseases that can weaken or kill the plant.

 Now to the original question: Most tomatoes are slowly coming this year because of the tremendous amount of rain we had in June. Depending on when you planted them, you should at least have some green tomatoes by now. They should be ripening soon. Even my cherry tomatoes, usually the first to show up, are only green. So be a little patient. In a few weeks you will have enough tomatoes to share with your neighbors.

3. Should I fertilize my lawn and/or plant more grass seed now? 
No! No! No! Lawn fertilizer put down now will generally burn your grass even more. All fertilizers need to be well watered in any time of the year. And, by the way, you only need to add fertilizer to your lawn twice a year, in the spring and the fall. Fertilizing it at other times of the year is unnecessary and usually a waste of money.
As for seeding or overseeding your lawn wait 3 or 4 weeks. Late August through September is the absolute best time to grow grass. So wait till then to overseed your lawn if it needs it. And just overseed unless you have bare patches that should be loosened up, raked, etc. 

Et Cetera (Odds and ends):
-Japanese Beetles have launched, so you do not need to worry about turf grubs for a while. UMASS Extension reports that there are fewer Japanese beetles and more Asiatic Garden Beetles this year. 

-Deer tick nymphs (which are very tiny) are remaining active. To prevent the possibility of getting Lyme Disease check yourself and your outside pets very carefully.

-In you have perennial hibiscus that have leaves that look like Swiss Cheese, they have probably been attacked by the hibiscus sawfly. Mine have suffered significant damage this summer.

For more answers to lawn and garden questions and to get your soil tested, come to our Gardening Information and Soil Testing Kiosk at Paradise Valley Park (Prospect and Paradise Avenues) in Middletown. Bring insect or plant problems and we will do our best to help you with your problems. We are there every Saturday through the end of September, rain or shine, from 11-1.
Contact us at gardeninginformationri@gmail.com.