One of the most common things people either forget about or neglect when it comes to taking care of their new home is the lawn.
Why? Well that’s a good question. It’s easy to forget about lawn maintenance when you spend most of your time inside your home. When a neglected lawn can rear it’s ugly head however is when that North Carolina Spring rolls around.
Hopefully you’ve been taking care of your lawn all year, but if not, in order to be proud of your lawn – or even to prepare it for a summer sale – you need to know a few things.
While the cost to maintain a lawn can vary greatly based on size, landscaping and more, your first step in taking care of your lawn is to either create a plan on attack (see below) or contact a professional. Many Triangle companies offer either one-time service or year-round treatment services.
If you have considered contacted a professional lawn service to help maintain your lawn, you’re probably looking at somewhere between $169 and $249. Keep in mind that the greater the total square footage that needs to be mowed, treated and controlled, the more expensive and time consuming it will be for a professional.
To keep it simple, we’ll break down the four major lawn maintenance items that should be on your schedule year round. You can certainly get “fancier” with everything you do, but this is the bare minimum to have a great looking lawn.
Mowing
You’ll want to cut it really the lawn short in the beginning of the season to give it a “proverbial” trim, then keep up with regular weekly or bi-weekly mowing until it freezes. This can easily be done by yourself, definitely, but is one of the items that can be paid out to a professional or neighbor for a low cost.
Watering
Lawns need to be watered regularly. This may entail you physically setting up sprinklers by dragging hoses all over your yard or you might consider installing an underground sprinkler system. Once the system is installed, it basically runs itself. Just remember to to blow out your sprinklers before and after the winter to make sure they stay in working order!
Cleaning
Every fall and spring you’ll need to clean up your lawn. By this we mean removing fallen leaves or branches and getting rid of any other debris that may inhibit other growth.
Seeding
Make sure you put some time in seasonally to nurture your lawn by seeding it, aerating it and using other gardening techniques to keep weeds away. Once weeds do take over it can be even more of a hassle and cost more money than if you periodically keep up with it throughout the year. In North Carolina you especially need to look out for crab grass!