The vast majority of lawns in North America have been installed with sod, and this is 100% Kentucky bluegrass: a species that stands up very well to trampling and our Canadian winters, and provides an immediate effect. Unfortunately, it’s also a very demanding plant in terms of fertilizers and water. If ideal conditions don’t prevail, it will weaken and fall easy prey to lawn pests such as chinch bugs and grubs. In fact, “pests” are there to eliminate the weak. It’s the law of nature. If we have a diversity of plants in our lawn, like in a jungle, there will always be one or another that will survive a drought, poor or compacted soil, or resist this or that predator.
How Do You Make the Switch?
So you’ve laid sod recently, but you’re wondering how to get a greener lawn to attract pollinators?
It goes without saying that you should no longer use a company that uses selective herbicides. Professionals may still use pesticides that are not available to consumers. So be careful, because some contractors will tell you that they only use products authorized by the government. Sure, but they’re still pesticides! And if you see a “spotless” lawn, without a single dandelion, you can be sure that herbicides have been applied, unless you’ve seen the owner on all fours in his lawn for hours on end.
What’s more, you must stop applying fertilizers to your lawn, otherwise it will remain vigorous and native flora will take time to establish itself. But don’t expect a whole host of pretty flowers to take hold spontaneously. It can take years if you don’t help nature a little. You need to introduce biodiversity little by little by sowing through the existing lawn: this is called over-seeding.
Low-Maintenance Turf Mixes
There’s currently a trend to do away with grass altogether and replace it with ground cover or flower beds. This is a good idea if you don’t have young children who want to play and run around damaging your flowers. This method also entails considerable installation and maintenance costs in the first few years. The simplest option for transforming a uniform lawn into an eco-friendly one is to over-seed the surface with a variety of plants that can withstand regular cutting, and there’s no shortage of choice.
For several years now, garden centers have been offering low-maintenance lawn mixes. They mainly contain grasses that don’t need fertilizers, but it’s best to opt for a mix that also contains white clover: a plant that can fix nitrogen from the air and blooms all summer long! What’s more, these mixtures generally contain endophytes that offer better resistance to certain turfgrass pests, such as chinch bugs and sod webworms.
How to Overseed
Early spring is the best time to overseed, as the turf that survived the winter is still weak and leaves plenty of room for competition. What’s more, there will often be completely bare spots due to de-icing salts or infestation from the previous summer.
So, as soon as you’re able to walk on the lawn after the thaw, you’ll first need to use a lawn rake to pick up any remaining dead leaves or other winter debris. To remove dead grass, use a dethatching rake or, in larger areas, a motorized scarifier to create furrows of bare soil.
The next step is to sow with the mixture you have chosen. You can broadcast the seed, but if the surface is large, you may want to use a seeder. When you’ve finished, cover with a thin layer of compost or lawn soil (about 0.5 cm, 1/4″). This is called topdressing, as it adds a little organic matter to the lawn. You can also mix the potting soil with the seeds in a wheelbarrow before proceeding, but targeted sowing will ensure better coverage of really bare spots.
Flowering Lawns
If you do nothing, all sorts of opportunistic plants will appear spontaneously, including crabgrass (a broad-leaved annual grass) and dandelions. But if you want a lawn with small-leaved plants, it’s best to give nature a helping hand. Species that go well with lawns include white clover, of course, but also birdsfoot trefoil, creeping thyme, sedum, houstonia, violet, antennaria, strawberry, brunella, speedwell and many others.
Many of these small flowers can appear on their own, but there are specialized companies that offer mixes with a variety of small flowering plants. For some species, success will be better if you buy small plants. For example, creeping thyme, which can sometimes be found in small cells in garden centres. Three or five plants per m2 (2 or 3 per 10 ft2 ) will do the trick. Another very hardy, drought-resistant species is yarrow. It won’t flower, as it would have to reach 30 cm in height, but the plant spreads by rhizomes in the lawn and its foliage is very soft under bare feet.
The results of overseeding will become increasingly visible after a few years, depending on the density of the turf in place and your repeated efforts each year. A number of factors also need to be taken into consideration, such as soil pH and type, compaction, etc. By observing what grows spontaneously around your home, in vacant lots, meadows or forest edges, you’ll get a good idea of which plants like your environment.
Lawns are a sore subject in California. Many of us dislike them as a waste of water. Conversely, most lawn area is completely unused, within medians of large boulevards, and within large industrial complexes. A single large useless lawn may be a few acres, and bigger than many home gardens lawns that are left to go fallow because those who live with them want to conserve water. It is both extremes. Incidentally, Kentucky bluegrass is passe here. Although some varieties of it are still in use, several other types of grass are more popular. In the Pacific Northwest, many lawns are not actually installed as sod. They are merely mown grass of whatever happened to grow in an area. They are actually quite appealing.
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