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gixxerific
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Fall fertilizing fact or myth?

You Floridian's, Californian's and Texan's need not apply here. :P

I was always under the impression that fall fertilizing of grass was not the "best" thing to do with winter coming on.

Grass goes dormant in the winter and I thought that you don't want a lot of top growth that can be damaged during those cold month's. Am I wrong or what?

I just keep seeing these commercials on TV about how the fall is the "Best time" to fertilize. Are they right or just trying to sell more of their grass killing fert's to the unknown?

The Helpful Gardener
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I think you know the answer to that one already... :wink:

Does the phrase "Rinse, lather, REPEAT" mean anything to you? :lol:

HG

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gixxerific
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Little confused but I think you are saying it is okay to fert in the fall. I hope so cause I already did with corn gluten. So it's too late if I was wrong.

I just gave it a light going over. Hoping for the best.

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tomf
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In this part of Oregon after the dry summer the grass gets green again in the fall and mostly stays green through the winter.

FlyingHDsod
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Howdy Gixxerific. My name is Mike and I work for The Home Depot in the Chicago area. Fall fertilizing is a good thing. Think of it as a bear hibernating for the winter. He must fatten up so he can survive the sleep. All the fertilizer is doing is giving that grass a big dose of food. When the grass wakes up from the dormant stage it will be a nice green color and very healthy. What the winterizor does is help strengthen the roots for the spring. Also in the fall it will absorb the nutrients and help kill any pesky weed that is straggling behind the rest.


Mike

The Helpful Gardener
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Organically speaking, the corn gluten is low nitrogen, so there won't be a huge release any way. No harm, no foul.

FHDS, what is the key factor in snow mold? Sending a lawn into winter fat on nitrogen. So now we need to use a fungicide too; how convenient they have included it in the bag for me... At least Gixx's corn gluten encourages trichoderma, a fungus that eats fungus. And it isn't water soluble...

The majority of your chemical fall fertility is wasted on grass that is fattening roots, not shoots. There goes excess nitrogen into the rivers and downstream to create coastal dead zones. There goes water soluble phosphorus at a time when the plants are using less, polluting ponds and streams. All this not just wasted on your turf, but now polluting groundwater.

Mulch your grass clippings and get 2 pounds of organic nitrogen per 1000 square feet a year. Thats all most of our native cool season grasses need. Blue grass is usually much more hungry so I don't use it (but there are some new strains that are much better). I worry about my Long Island Sound and my ponds and streams, so fall feeding gets a thumbs down. Cheap and easy wins out for this swamp Yankee...

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Stella Blue
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I try to "KISS". Keep It Simple Stupid. Use my lawn mower to mulch the leaves. Saves time on raking (except for the leaves I put in my compost pile), and adds organic matter back into my lawn without giving my hard-earned money to Home Depot. And like said previously, I'm not polluting OUR soil and water systems.

The Helpful Gardener
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Right on SB...

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jonthepain
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The Helpful Gardener wrote:FHDS, what is the key factor in snow mold? Sending a lawn into winter fat on nitrogen. So now we need to use a fungicide too; how convenient they have included it in the bag for me...
How convenient, indeed. Keeping our lawns addicted, as it were.
The majority of your chemical fall fertility is wasted on grass that is fattening roots, not shoots.


Absolutely. We should be encouraging root growth, not pumping up the blades and tillers.
There goes excess nitrogen into the rivers and downstream to create coastal dead zones. There goes water soluble phosphorus at a time when the plants are using less, polluting ponds and streams. All this not just wasted on your turf, but now polluting groundwater.
To me, that's the real crime that Home Cheapo and the chemical fertilizer companies are committing.

And it's so unnecessary! Create healthy soil - by adding compost, mulching, adding compost tea, mowing fairly high, sparingly using corn gluten meal or fish emulsion or kelp or whatever organic, slow release fert you decide upon - and your turf will grow nice and deep and thick and healthy, crowding out weeds and resisting pests and drought.


Cheap and easy wins out for this swamp Yankee...
Right on, HG.



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