Garden Product Advice

[Gypop]

Can anyone help?

I would like some advice about which lawn weed and feed product to use. I already have some that I was going to put down a couple of nights ago but then I got worried that it would be damaging to the ground feeders I have in my garden. These include sparrows (lots of them!), blackbirds, starlings, magpies and occasionally the goldfinch feed from the ground.

I am hoping to find a bird friendly method of getting rid of the countless dandylions other than digging them all out!

[Hornbeam]

My advice is don't use any feeds or weeders. I mow regularly and leave the grass box off for the first two cuts of the year. Then I just mow and the dandelions are constantly beheaded, are weakened and fade away.

The blackbirds, starlings and robins hunt my lawn and I am never troubled with leather jackets or other lawn pests. If I used chemicals then the creepy crawlies would be poisoned and the toxins passed on to the birds. The birds pass the toxins on to their chicks and the poison becomes ever more concentrated as it passes up the food chain Suddenly you have no more birds in your garden

[Lance Morgan]

Originally Posted by Gypop

Can anyone help?

I would like some advice about which lawn weed and feed product to use. I already have some that I was going to put down a couple of nights ago but then I got worried that it would be damaging to the ground feeders I have in my garden. These include sparrows (lots of them!), blackbirds, starlings, magpies and occasionally the goldfinch feed from the ground.

I am hoping to find a bird friendly method of getting rid of the countless dandylions other than digging them all out!

Ordinary feeder high in Nitrogen in granular form should not be a problem. I usually spot weed the lawn with a lawn weedkiller. I do not use pesticides on the lawn.

[Cotham Marble]

Originally Posted by Gypop

Can anyone help?

I would like some advice about which lawn weed and feed product to use. I already have some that I was going to put down a couple of nights ago but then I got worried that it would be damaging to the ground feeders I have in my garden. These include sparrows (lots of them!), blackbirds, starlings, magpies and occasionally the goldfinch feed from the ground.

I am hoping to find a bird friendly method of getting rid of the countless dandylions other than digging them all out!

>These include sparrows (lots of them!), blackbirds, starlings, magpies and occasionally the goldfinch feed from the ground.<

Lucky You !

Perhaps this is time to rethink how you want your lawn to work within your garden. As Horbeam has said mowing does suppress weeds, although this is not sufficient if a 'bowling green' finish is required.

With a 'wildlife' focus perhaps you could allow a degree of loss in the appearance of your lawn, and move to manual removal of the worst weeds (I find an old wood chisel makes a good dandylion remover).

Feeding a lawn is a bit of circular activity - the more you feed, the more you need to cut, the more you cut the more nutirent you remove, the more you need to feed.

Mowers that force the cutting back into the soil rather than use a 'catch box' are one option, allowing reduced feeding, as is is setting the blade height higher.

Garden compost is of course an excellent conditioner for a lawn, but if you do need to add a feed, there are organic alternatives available - try searching via google. Even with these I would suggest appying at half the recommended dosage.

With climate change very likely to increase the number of long dry spells we experience, and increasing pressure on water supplies, we are anyway likely to have to change the traditional ways of managing turf. Low input, less frequent cutting and longer blade growth are probably going to be forced on us all in the longer term.

CM

[smartie]

I agree it does very much depend how you want your lawn to work. If you want bowling green or football pitch our methods would defnitely not suit. Ours is well at the other end of the spectrum, for the reasons Hornbeam mentions and because we like flowers and diversity more than mown grass. We don't feed or do much weeding. The mower is always set fairly high, and at this time of year we leave some patches of grass to grow long and effectively just cut broad paths where we want to walk. I cut the flower heads off the dandelions before they can seed, and hand weed any that get too big. We allow daisies, buttercups, dead nettle, clover and speedwells (and some moss when the weather is wet) to grow in the grass. They get their heads cut off from time to time, but they come up smiling again and provide nectar for bees and other insects. Snowdrops, primroses, cowslips, squill, bluebells (unfortunately Spanish ) and any other spring flowers that want to join in have been allowed to naturalise round the edges of the lawn and get repatriated to the beds when they get too close to the middle.

I've never counted the many varieties of different grasses and plantains that we get - a project for this year, maybe.

[Gypop]

Thank you so much for your advice!

I have decided that I definitely won't be using any weed and feed products particularly as I am happy to see the daisies, clover and buttercups on my lawn (and other wild flowers that I can't identify!) I am not interested in a bowling green finish as I like my little garden to have character!

I was really only looking for a way to tackle dandylions as I don't have the time to mow my lawn as often as I'd like to and they do tend to go wild! I'll stick to kicking off their heads before they seed, digging out the biggest offenders and keeping the catch box off my mower now and again! It's a shame they are so prolific and have the knack to get EVERYWHERE as they really can be quite pretty!



Can anyone tell me if there are any wildlife implications with seeding my lawn?

[Hornbeam]

Lovely photo! You can buy special lawn seed mixtures to suit various soils and also wildflower lawn mixtures which will give you wildflowers and grass. You should see the lovely purple self-heal flowers in your lawn if you don't mow too closely around June time. I just love the daisies and speedwell that I get in my mown lawn. I have another lawn further away from the house and I only mow that once a year in August. The wildflowers in the spring and summer are fantastic. Just one cut and remember to remove ALL of the hay as it is essential to reduce fertility - so no fertilisers or organic compost at all for a wildflower lawn. Good luck

This is the lawn near the house. It is never fed and never weeded. Dandelions are not a problem and the daisies and self-heal are happy with a weekly close mowing. I remove the clippings except for the first two cuts of the year.


The second lawn is in an old orchard and so gets some shade. In the spring there are primroses, cowslips, false oxlips and fritillaries. Then comes red campion, speedwell, dog violets, sweet violets, forget-me-nots, cow parsley and various hardy geraniums. I love it and it only gets cut once a year in late summer when all the flowers have set seeds. Then I cut with a strimmer, rake off and compost. Dead easy and labour saving too

[Gypop]

Those pictures are so beautiful! I'm very very envious of both lawns!

I do see some small purply blue flowers in my lawn at the front of the house at this time of year and I wonder if these are self heal?

I have a small patch of land at the side of my house and have often thought about trying to turn this into a wild flower area but it is very shaded and bearly gets any sun at all. Does anyone have any suggestions for which plants flourish in these sort of conditions? At the moment it seems nettles, docks and brambles are winning!

[Hornbeam]

How moist is your shady area? There are lots of flowering plants and ferns that you can grow in damp shade. Dry shade is much harder, but Lily of the valley will do well in dry shade.

Try to get Chris Baines book "How to make a Wildflower Garden" It tells you everything you need to know and gives lists of plants for every location and type of soil

[Cotham Marble]

Originally Posted by Gypop

Those pictures are so beautiful! I'm very very envious of both lawns!

I do see some small purply blue flowers in my lawn at the front of the house at this time of year and I wonder if these are self heal?

I have a small patch of land at the side of my house and have often thought about trying to turn this into a wild flower area but it is very shaded and bearly gets any sun at all. Does anyone have any suggestions for which plants flourish in these sort of conditions? At the moment it seems nettles, docks and brambles are winning!

Almost certainly self heal.

Re: your shady area, I grow three of my favourite plants in a bed on the north side of my house which never receives full sun - sweet woodruff (Galium odoratum) meadowsweet (Filipendula ulmaria) and sweet cicely (Myrrhis odorata). The last one of these is not a native plant but is a good representative of the cow parsley family. There are many plants, particularly easy to manage perrenials which will survive in a low light position, so as Horneam suggests, get a good book from which you can build a plan.

CM