For the hedges, I use an electric trimmer that I think was my grandfather's. It works great, so I'm sure your gas one will be fine as well. I use an axe (sharpened several times annually) to edge, combined with pulling the grass by hand, removing the soil and replacing it, and discarding the grass. ...

Yep, I ended up with three small (very small hand sized) patches. The R-word stuff went on them yesterday as I always use the nuclear option on P. annua. Nothing else works reliably enough and is as inexpensive as Round Up. Since that's down from last year's repair of 250 square feet, I can't say I'...

I do think it's accurate. I did a subsequent one also with Cornell, but those buggers didn't offer any recommendations because I wasn't a NY state resident. I am going to send U Mass one again this year. I figure every two years just out of curiousity and because my P and K levels haven't been the ...

when there is no mass-market demand for fertilizers with P, they will have NO IDEA how to get it if they really have a deficiency. The big-boxes never handle a low-volume item - never. Excellent point! Although the soil testing firms may be smart enough to recommend the use of starter fertilizer (a...

Don't worry, they'll finagle the fertilizer testing or "forget" something and re-brand low P fertilizers to no-P bags. :-) No, I'm not a Libertarian, what's it to you? I do wonder about us organic people. What I use comes out of a plain brown bag. It does contain P, about 1-2% depending on what I us...

I gotta admit, I paid $13.75 for 50 lbs of soy last year, and that's down to $10.97. It's not quite at 2006 levels ($8.70) but it's drifting back. Corn's down, too, although I never bothered recording the price last year as I didn't use that much. This year I did and I'll track it from here on out. ...

Do you think the test is accurate? For $13, I'd have no qualms about sending a sample off.

They have to, just like any other company has to protect their brand name, trademarks, patents, and copyrights. If they can't show they have they run the risk of losing them--Kleenex is right on the edge of that as it's incredibly commonly used as a generic name. I don't fault them for that as they ...

Only if the lawn is actively growing and if you think you have soil compaction issues. Don't aerate if the lawn isn't back yet--one, it looks terrible and takes a while to come back. Two, damaging the roots before they have a chance to restart the top growth is not a wonderful idea as they need ever...

Well, I have to admit to fertilizing two weeks BEFORE I sowed seed, but I used soy and alfalfa. Those take an appreciable amount of time to break down so I usually have to anticipate what I'm going to need at least 3 weeks before I actually need it. I just consider it a challenge and keep my crystal...

If you wait until first mow then sure, mow the leaf waste in. Your lawn will thank you. That looks good for older KBG, so whatever you're doing is working just fine...Bestlawn is right, though, your old lawn will probably overgrow the new stuff. Adjust accordingly, and/or renovate in fall. You don't...

I don't know how they can get away with that (although I'm sure it's ten pounds of "product" which would be legal). Given the price, I'd rather put down seed and top coat it with peat moss or something. Same effect, lower price. I wish we could train the consumer to read the bag, at least, realizing...

Wowsers. I saw that image over at Lawnsmarts, and had the famous Eyebrow Raise, a la Mr. Spock. All of the above is correct...it's also possible that the humic acid you added is binding a little of that iron, making it available to your grass. I deal with a very low natural pH soil, raised to 6.8 by...

Strangely, Scott's mixes were the reason I started looking at grass types myself. Every bag I picked up seemed to have a lot of the same grasses even though they claimed they were for different areas and uses. And what was this Kenblue and Abbey? (a bit later) ... oh. So how hard is this renovation ...

As far as I've cared to note, everything makes good food for everybody (verified, somewhat anecdotally, with a really cheap microscope). Bacteria, fungal hyphae, nematode, and...mysterious moving thingy...counts all surged. The paramecia are so cute! I'm sure Joe's right and each have their preferen...

Thanks for all the suggestions. I have 7500 sqft, so it sounds like UGC might not be my best choice. I tried some cracked corn last year with the intent of using its fungicide benefits. I think I'll try that again this spring. Anyone had luck using a hybrid approach (some synthetics, some organics)...

I wanna try!

Charlie was a chemist,
But Charlie is no more,
What Charlie thought was H₂O,
Was H₂SO₄.

Kewl.

How about the use of humic acid? I use Turf Pro USA: http://www.turfprousa.com/ An interesting article on Humate Materials: http://turfprousa.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=49&Itemid=34 Excellent point, and one I forgot. I use Nature's Magic on my lawn and gardens for the humic acid ...

Morpheus: Tieing up water molecules in crystalline salts and binding phosphates in the soil at the same time doesn't seem like a direction that we want to go, assuming that the soil consultant is correct. None of us wants to wait 1000 years for plants and weeds to bring the proper level of each ele...

I've never used it and kind of wish I had. The initial lawn had a lot of weeds that I had to remove, but the renovation in late 2006 didn't have many issues. Still, for 2 years I put up with a very weedy lawn. Encourage the grass and it won't allow weeds to grow. The seeds and weeds need sunlight, w...