Damn Lawn!

[crazylegs]

My girlfriend and I bought our first house last year. It comes with a nice little garden with a patch of grass in the back garden (a lawn might be a bit of an exaggeration though).

It wasn't in the best condition last year but we had to concentrate on the house - dealing with the appalling state of the DIY that the last owners had managed to conduct in the 4 years that they had had the house from new.

So I start this year to try to tackle the lawn a little.

It's chock full of weeds and doesn't appear to to be a shade resistant variety of grass (which is important seeing as said grass is in shade for at least 50% of the day). So I've been dealing with the weeds with feed/weed/mosskiller and a weed busting widget I bought at the local DIY store.

What I've now discovered are chafer grubs & leatherjackets are in the lawn too. Only I can't use the normal pesticides because of the pond (don't ask). This leaves me with one option. Biological warfare - admittdly not cheap but I'm damned if I'm going to be beaten by a inch long grey bit of gloop!

[Crossbow]

Ouch. Sounds like you have your work cut out for you.

Biggest issue we have is weeds, specifically dandelions (big surprise) and thistles. Oh and the Morning Glory from hell.

Ok, second biggest. Biggest is my wife is allergic to fresh cut grass and I don't seem to give a damn...

[crazylegs]

This http://eng-uk.fiskars.com/Products/L...10-Weed-Puller works rather well - takes out the entire tap root too. Unfortunately the dandelions in my lawn are so big they've left huge bare patches...

[Crossbow]

I love that thing. It's been fantastic at getting rid of the short thistles. When they hit 3 feet tall, mobile, and have figured out how to fire their spines, however....

Yes, I DO have a rather aggressive lawn. Why do you ask?

[LillFilly]

Dig it all up and grow clover. Problem solved!

[AccountingDrone]

Rob's maternal grandfather [the one that was a high scaler at Hoover Dam, among others] paved his yard and painted it green.

To be honest, I have never really cared for one of the golf course like green lawns. To me, a large expanse of land without a garden for food or a building on it is somewhere to graze my animals ... I would be just as happy paving my yard in flagstones or brick.

[crazylegs]

I think it's just because it's there, so now I have to beat them.

To that end I've ordered some biological death from the internet (can't really put that as my facebook status!) so that should even the score slightly.

I'm looking forward to taking these bugs down.

[Der Cute]

Personally, I'd nuke that fucker (take it alllll out), add some fill dirt to your scale /pitch you want, and lay down sod. Make sure there's not much raw dirt spots for the dandelions to take hold.

you have too much to fix with one person's effort. If you pull out the damn thing, think about making a section for veggie garden or raised bed garden (2 birds with one stone) . Yank the bad grass out, measure the garden area, build your edges, add that fill dirt in with your order.

The grass you have isn't the right grass, first of all, and your weeds like you so much they've settled in and called their family to live there too. My grampa used to sit and just GET the dandelions out by hand. He used a tool like a screwdriver except a long shaft, and it had a pronged edge on it. Shove it down in the dirt, pry the bastards out, get as much taproot out and (if you want) put some chemical on it to kill the rest of it. down towards end. Dandelion Tool (great name)
Bugs, hell, I dunno.

[crazylegs]

Quoth Der Cute

If you pull out the damn thing, think about making a section for veggie garden or raised bed garden (2 birds with one stone) .

We've already got raised beds/veggie patch - they actually do quite well!

[Marmalady]

Quoth crazylegs

I'm looking forward to taking these bugs down.

I take it that shouting 'Get off my lawn!' didn't help, then?