The other day while walking our family dog, Clementine, I came across an area of turf along the roadway that scared me. Okay, maybe not scared but it, at least, concerned me. It had been mowed very low - too low. It was scalped bare, and abused. It almost appeared as if a section of sod had been removed or cut out, but looking closely I could tell the string trimmer or weed eater had lowered the turf to an
uncomfortably low height.
This puzzled me. Why would someone do this? Fortunately at work I get the opportunity to interact with several folks and I thought I'd get their ideas on why this occurs. So I asked them, "What would cause someone to go crazy with their weed eater and cut their grass so low?" This is something I refer to as "scalping the turf." Several people told me that in all probability the offenders intentionally trimmed their grass too low in hopes they could skip a trim the next week. This makes sense, but it cheats your lawn and will cause bigger problems in the end. Scalping the turf is unsightly and it permits dormant weed seeds to germinate within your beautiful lawn. As we all know, when weeds grow your turf looks bad.
The best way to weed eat is to mimic the height of your lawn mower. This will keep the turf strong and full, and will discourage and minimize the growth of weeds. Imagine yourself as an artist and your line trimmer (weed eater) as your paintbrush. You simply want to lightly paint stokes of unity to match the lawn mower height for the rest of the lawn. Don't fall into the temptation of scalping the lawn because you think it will cause less work, in the end you will be disappointed with the weeds and the high maintenance time it generates.
The other day while walking our family dog, Clementine, I came across an area of turf along the roadway that scared me. Okay, maybe not scared but it, at least, concerned me. It had been mowed very low - too low. It was scalped bare, and abused. It almost appeared as if a section of sod had been removed or cut out, but looking closely I could tell the string trimmer or weed eater had lowered the turf to an
uncomfortably low height.
This puzzled me. Why would someone do this? Fortunately at work I get the opportunity to interact with several folks and I thought I'd get their ideas on why this occurs. So I asked them, "What would cause someone to go crazy with their weed eater and cut their grass so low?" This is something I refer to as "scalping the turf." Several people told me that in all probability the offenders intentionally trimmed their grass too low in hopes they could skip a trim the next week. This makes sense, but it cheats your lawn and will cause bigger problems in the end. Scalping the turf is unsightly and it permits dormant weed seeds to germinate within your beautiful lawn. As we all know, when weeds grow your turf looks bad.
The best way to weed eat is to mimic the height of your lawn mower. This will keep the turf strong and full, and will discourage and minimize the growth of weeds. Imagine yourself as an artist and your line trimmer (weed eater) as your paintbrush. You simply want to lightly paint stokes of unity to match the lawn mower height for the rest of the lawn. Don't fall into the temptation of scalping the lawn because you think it will cause less work, in the end you will be disappointed with the weeds and the high maintenance time it generates.