You’ve probably heard lots of advice from your neighbors. They probably say that starting a new lawn is hard work best left to professionals. Or you should bite the bullet and pay for sod. The fact is, you can save money and be successful starting a new lawn from seed. You just need a little preparation, quality seeds suited to your area, well-prepared soil, and a little patience. Fortunately, you can get beautiful results with good preparation and maintenance.

The type of seed you select does matter, and knowing which choice to make can make a huge difference in the success of your lawn over the course of several seasons. Find your best turf seed, or a list of grasses that will thrive in your area. Most good seed companies make up special lawn seed mixtures to suit soils (clay or sand), situations (sun or shade) and use (heavy or light). Be sure you specify your requirements when you order. Where the children will play on the lawn it is best to use a hard-wearing mixture which includes some rye grass, although this will require regular sowing. Finer mixtures without ryegrass need less cutting but won’t take such tough usage.

Once you’ve laid out the area where you want your future lawn, take a walk. It’s time to inspect your ground. Remove large rocks and debris before you work it over with a tiller. You don’t want peaks and valleys in your new lawn. Use a rake to even out the surface as much as you can. At this point, you might be tempted to bring in new topsoil. That’s not a good idea, since it may contain seeds of weeds that are tough to control. As you rake, keep removing any rocks or debris you come across. Poor soils should always be enriched so that the grass is constantly nourished. Lichen and mosses can be a nuisance on a poor soil. You can use any good lawn fertiliser or bonemeal.

A very important part is proper preparation, is its alignment and carefully sealed with a special heavy grass rink. This procedure is intended for uniform tamping soil, which in turn is key when you use your lawn in the future. If we sow grass on ground that is not compacted and let the soil settle naturally (without our intervention), the lawn will have an uneven surface, which will be difficult to mow. Individual sections of the lawn will also have slightly different conditions for growth and development, so that the grass will not have a unifom appearance.

Seeding a lawn is a simple process, as long as you follow certain steps. The best time to create a new lawn is in Spring or Autumn, when the soil is warm and there is enough moisture. But you can do it in Summer too if you water your lawn regularly. Sow the seeds for your lawn in calm weather. To prevent the seeds from being blown away or eaten by birds, sprinkle a light layer of soil or peat over the entire area and tamp it down.

Water in the morning and in the evening, as during the day water and moisture will evaporate, which may do more harm than good to the seed. Be generous when watering, but avoid puddles or stagnation of water. Drip irrigation or sprinklers can help to avoid the formation of gullies.

Great, your new lawn is growing vigorously. Now you have to cut it. Adjust your mower to a higher setting to keep the lawn nice and thick. When you cut it too short, weeds can sneak in. Seed usually germinates between ten to twenty days after sowing, depending on the weather. Knowing how to start a garden is important and keeping off the grass is important too until the young leaves, or blades, are two inches high. At this point it may be mown carefully. Use a machine with a roller attached, rather than one with side wheels which will cut into the soil. If your machine is old, be sure to have the blades sharpened or set or the tiny plants will be pulled out of the soil. The mower blades need to be set so that they just tip the grass. Mow this way, just tipping the grass once a week for a month. After this, gradually lower the blades. If weeds emerge, do not try to regulate them till the younger lawn has been mowed 4 instances. By this stage, many weeds could have been killed by mowing or crowded out by the rising lawn.