A healthy St. Augustine grass lawn will effectively crowd out most weeds

A healthy St. Augustine grass lawn will effectively crowd out most weeds

The act of caring for your St Augustine lawn can be therapeutic. Great lawns aren't made; they're grown. And it's up to you to keep them that way.

When I first moved into the neighborhood, into my first home, I just mowed it at whatever setting my mower was on. My grass was a weed and grass mixture. I was a typical new homeowner feeling pretty mowing his typical front lawn.

If you ask your neighbors “How short do you cut your Lawn?" you will receive several different answers.

At that time I had no idea what my grass was. It was grass... what’s the big deal?? ? Right.

After mowing it a few times I noticed more and more weeds were popping up everywhere??? What could this be and what chemical do I need to buy to fix this, and how expensive will this chemical be?

Well I started to research grasses and learn all about my grass. I read that by mowing too short I was killing this plant and I was allowing weeds and disease to kill my grass. I learned that some diseases are just out of my control and that a healthy lawn (just like a healthy person) is capable of combating diseases effectively. So a healthy lawn could effectively crowd out the weeds as well.


I soon realized that I could avoid chemicals, just let it grow out longer and thicker and greener instead of chemicals. I learned the most important lesson of all; let the plant be what it was meant to be. Let it grow, Let it grow, Let it grow.

Here are some simple lessons I learned.

Mow your lawn at 4 inches. Set your mower at 4 inches and leave it there. If you have to get a black magic permanent marker and mark 4 inches on your setting and set the mower at 4 inches and never change this. If you are starting to mow your lawn at 4 inches as a new routine now, it may take a few mows before you see a difference, because like any haircut, it has to grow into the new style you are creating. The mature height of St Augustine grass is 5 inches. So if you follow the rule: Remove no more than one-third of an inch at a time. Then you mow at 4 inches.

Some suggestions

- St Augustine will start to resemble a carpet when you mow at 4 inches, which is why it is nick named, “carpet grass.”

- Be cautious of scalping this type of grass (cutting it too short, so that the yellow or brown stem tissue is exposed). This may permanently damage its root system.

- Never reduce the height of the grass by more than one-third of an inch per mow. If the lawn is extremely long, cut one-third of an inch, allow it to rest a few days and cut it again.

- Mow when the grass is dry. If it has just rained or has been sprinkled, wait a few days.

- Do not bag the clippings. St. Augustine clippings left on the lawn will help the still-growing grass.

- Use a very sharp blade. A dull blade will damage St. Augustine grass, causing it to eventually turn brown.

- While waiting for bare spots to fill in, spread annual rye grass seeds from October to March and patch seeds from March to October.

- Palm fertilizer with higher than 10% Nitrogen can be used on all plants including St Augustine Grass.

- Dry season mowing is less often because this grass slows its rate of growth, so I have been able to get away with mowing every 2 -4 weeks, from October - March sometimes...

- Rainy season mowing has to mow more often because this grass at a faster rate from March - October. Please note since the grass is growing faster and it tops out at 5 inches tall, i can sometimes get with not mowing so often because the grass is usually grown out to 4 inches and is strong enough to go without a cut now and then looking fairly close to how it would look at 4 inches normally. I usually can get away with mowing every 2 weeks.

Most of my neighbors mow every 3 days or once a week regardless, which seems like such a waste of money and time or they don’t mow or water as often as they should and resembles a sandy pit of weeds, because they have given up.

- A healthy St. Augustine grass lawn effectively crowds out most weeds.

--- NANA
AUGUST 31, 2010