Feeding Your Lawn

Like all other plants, lawns thrive on a good and balanced diet! We often lavish attention and fertiliser on our roses, but forget that there are thousands of plants making up even a small area of lawn - all just as responsive to fertilisers too.

Essential minerals have vital functions to perform in plant growth - the single most important being Nitrogen (N). Grass with adequate nitrogen shows good green colour.

Phosphorous (P) affects all grass plant growth and is particularly helpful in the germination of seeds. Potassium (K) is also an essential element, although its function in grass is rather complex. Basically all we need to know is that it is linked to the general good health of the grass, helping it to resist diseases.

These three minerals (N,P and K) are the basis of most brands of lawn fertilisers although there are other nutrients the grass plant needs, but often only in minute quantities.

• Nitrogenous lawn fertilisers are Spring/Summer fertilisers and should be used only during the growing season - look on the pack to see the percentages of nutrients and a typical spring/summer one will look like this - 9%N, 7%P and 7%K.
• Autumn/winter fertilisers will contain only small amounts of nitrogen eg. 3%N, 10%P and 10%K.
• If you are looking for a pre-seeding fertiliser (if you are starting from scratch and seeding a new lawn) it should be in the region of 6%N, 9%P and 6%K.
• When applying lawn fertilisers, try to make the spread as even as possible to ensure even growth and colour and follow the manufacturers instructions carefully.
• If you are on clay, sandy or chalk soil you may get a better result from a foliar feed - just as it sounds, this feed is absorbed through the leaf of the grass rather than its roots.