How to water your lawn correctly

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How to water your lawn the right way! Some say eight out of ten lawn care problems center around correct watering practices. Properly watering will prevent lawns from drying out, discouraging excess or new weed growth, and help prevent disease problems. There are three main factors of successful lawn watering: duration - how long you water, frequency - how often you water, and when - what time of day you water. The proper duration is easily determined, and it's really a one time check. It's simply a matter of wetting the soil to the proper depth. For most grasses that means wetting the soil to about six inches. Watering deeper than six inches is generally both unnecessary and wasteful. Wetting the soil to a depth of 6 inches would normally require the application of one-half inch of irrigation water. To find out if you have the right settings, simply put out a number of jars, pans or cans to catch the water. These containers can be any straight sided collector. Place them randomly about the lawn, turn on the sprinklers and let the water run while periodically checking after about 20 minutes. When you have a half inch of water in most of the collectors you have the time you need to let the irrigation run. A side benefit is that by using many collectors you can also adjust your sprinkling pattern if you find too much water in areas and not enough in others. Remember, using too little water will wet only the top layer of soil. As a result, grass roots will be shallow and unable to withstand our summer heat and sun. Coddling your grass will not help in the long run. You will encourage weaker culture and fungal proliferation if you water often as a result. Weed seeds will also have a field day, they will sprout and fill in the areas where thirsty grass dies as they tend to be early opportunists and suited for harsher settins. So when watering, always apply the recommended one half inch. To determine the proper frquency, or how often to water your lawn is best done by a visual check. You need to watch for the early stages of wilt which will clue you in on when to water. Grass that is stressed for moisture will appear dull, thinner bladed and off-color. Adequately watered grass is generally a bright, shiny green, while patches or sections that are water stressed will appear dull and gray-green in color. This drying grass will loose its springiness and is susceptible to damage by traffic. Generally, watering every three days will keep the grass from overstressing. Periodically check for wilt and adjust the intervals between watering as needed. Skip watering cycles when adequate rainfall occurs. This will help conserve water and more importantly, reduce fungal diseases. Another way to both conserve water and do a better job watering is to irrigate your lawn in the early morning hours. The ideal time to water is between 5:00 and 6:00 in the morning. In the cool of the early morning less water is lost to evaporation and wind conditions are generally calm so irrigation water goes where it is intended. Evening watering of lawns should be avoided in most circumstances because of the possibility of fungal disease infection and proligeration. Grass which stays wet for more that 6 hours at a time is subject to fungal diseases. Ideally, you want to water enough but early enough so that the blades and surface are dry by nightfall! So remember, the key to watering successfully is all about the duration, the frequecy and when you water! Make the right choices and your lawn will shine! Other tips via Google!