Richard Gilliland asked:


Part of the fun of living in Orlando is the ability to grow a lush lawn in every season. Outdoor recreation is enhanced by a beautiful lawn. For the best looking lawn in your neighborhood, twelve months out of the year, follow these lawn care tips for Orlando homeowners.

• Keep your grass mown at the tallest possible height for the grass species in your lawn. Grass grows a root system that is directly proportional to the height of the grass plant aboveground. To encourage healthy root growth, and reduce the need for watering, keep your grass as high as is optimum for the species.

• Keep your mower blades sharp. Sharp mower blades have several benefits. First, you will use less fuel to mow the lawn if mower blades are kept sharp. Second, your lawn will look cleaner and greener. The “whitish haze” on newly mown lawns is caused by mowers with dull blades that tear rather than cut the grass. The incomplete tears dry up and turn brown, rather than healing cleanly and staying green.

• Get a soil test at least once a year and amend the soil accordingly. Soil test instructions and kits are available from your local cooperative extension office. A qualified landscape professional can also collect a soil sample and send it for analysis. Before spending money on fertilizer, it is a good idea to have a soil test. The nutrients your grass needs might be in the soil already, but unavailable due to soil pH or the lack of organic matter. (A common problem in the sandy soils of Florida.) You may need to adjust the soil type or acidity before fertilizing to get the most bang for your buck.

• Leave grass clippings on your lawn. Warm season grasses are prone to thatch problems, but grass clippings do not cause thatch buildup. If you remove no more than 1/3 of the grass blade at any time while you are mowing, the clippings will dry up and decompose quickly, adding precious organic matter back into the soil.

• Aerate in the spring or fall, but not during the summer. Aerating is both beneficial and stressful for your grass. During hot Orlando summers, aerating can cause unnecessary stress for the plants. A spring or fall aeration schedule will allow your plants to recover quickly from being sliced apart. For best results, top-dress with a compost/topsoil blend. This will help amend the soil and add organic matter, as well as counter the effects of soil compaction. Aerating is especially important for lawns that see a lot of recreational use.

• Water deeply and infrequently. Depending on the time of year, your grass will need more or less water. December-March, your lawn will need about 1/3 as much water as during the summer months. This is because the grass is mostly dormant and not actively growing. This watering technique will also help your grass plants grow deep roots, which will come in handy during a drought.

• Calibrate sprinkler heads. To be certain that your lawn is being watered evenly, check your sprinkler system. Put five straight sided cans or pans around your yard and turn on the sprinklers for a timed run. After the sprinklers cut off, measure the amount of water in each pan. If one contains more than the other, you need to re-calibrate the distance and overlap of the sprinkler heads, or check for leaks.

A well-maintained lawn can provide hours of peaceful relaxation after the work is done. For the healthiest lawn in Orlando, Florida, follow the above lawn care tips.



Start a Lawn Care Business A Whole New Way!

Organic Gardener asked:


Water-wise “naturescapes” offer savings

When it comes to watering your lawn and paying water bills, sound gardening practices can cut down homeowner investments of effort, time and money, reports the American Association of Nurserymen. And, you don’t have to turn your lovely colorful landscape into a rock garden featuring a sprinkling of cactus plants.

This popular approach to water management and water-conserving landscape design has been commonly known as Xeriscaping, and because the term comes from the Greek for “dry” many people assume it describes desert landscapes. That couldn’t be further from the truth. In contrast, the approach focuses on working with nature’s guidelines to create a lush looking landscape. As a matter of fact, “naturescaping” can be another way to describe this water-wise landscape design and management.

Turning your yard and garden into a “naturescape” requires some common sense and planning. That entails choosing the best plants, soils, locations, and irrigation systems for efficient water use. Some of those water-wise plant materials include vibrantly colored perennials and lush varieties of shrubs.

The keys to “naturescaping” involve how, when, and what you water in taking care of your property. Low-volume irrigation systems such as drip-watering devices reduce water use by 50 percent. Early-morning watering cuts down on evaporation.

Water-wise “naturescapes” offer savings. Grouping plants by water requirements is a smart way to guard against overwatering some plants and underwatering others. Save water by replacing leaky parts of irrigation devices and positioning sprinklers to shower areas of vegetation, as opposed to the driveway, garage, or deck.

A constant among guidelines for being water-wise is maintaining the health of your plants. Strong plants don’t need as much water as weak ones do. We have many reports from gardeners that Spray-N-Grow helps their plants withstand drought much better than those not sprayed with Spray-N-Grow. That’s because Spray-N-Grow helps plants develop a better root structure-more roots that are larger and longer. Plants that have a better root structure are more able to “find” any available moisture.

Be sure to add the needed soil amendments and mulch around plants to keep the roots moist. When adding to your landscape, don’t forget to include drought-resistant plants and grasses to those you already have.

Before you begin planning your new “naturescape” or planning how to convert your current landscape into a more water-efficient one, be sure to check with the experts at your retail nursery/garden center. They can offer the most valuable assistance for getting the best results.



Lawn Care Business Marketing Plan

Jean Ma asked:


People seem to start avoiding extra expenses like vacations, hobbies and sadly, even lawn care, due to economic crisis. It is common to hold back household and outdoor projects due to budgeting. Also, the right care for landscape is now being forgotten by people just to save money. But these aren’t the right solutions to the problem, in fact, it would increase it. The landscape will start to look ugly and unhealthy in which the needed money to make repairs would only increase and so is the work needed. But there is a chance for you to have the best lawn in the neighborhood while still saving so much money. This is if you have the right knowledge and you use your resources right.

Right Lawn Habits to Save Money:

Mow your grass not lower than 2-1/2 inches to as high as 3-1/2 inches. Keeps grass moist longer for less need to water Not as much drag on blades so less gas usage No risk in undercutting and letting sun damage grass roots which will cost a lot of time and money to repair Smaller mulch pieces for quick decomposing and helps with fertilizing the uncut grass Keep animals off of lawns and garden areas Saves hassle of having brown spots all around the yard from animal urine which is hard to repair due to the fact it kills the grass roots in that area. No plants and flowers getting trampled requiring you to re-buy and re-plant to keep garden looking good. Catch weed, insect, and fungus problems early Saves from spreading so minimizing repairing costs Will not have to keep repairing/fertilizing the same area every few weeks due to killing the problem at its early stages. Aerating your lawn Only done periodically (every few years) this can loosen up the soil and allow nutrients to flow through the roots easier Helps keep fertilizers in the roots where it is needed instead of running off due to difficulty in sinking in Don’t leave objects sitting on grass for long periods of time ex. trailers, pots, hoses Seemingly small tip but can prevent grass dying for “being lazy” and not putting away your equipment Keeps lawn better managed and organized looking

Right Lawn Products to Save Money:

Use high quality fertilizers May be more expensive, but you will need to use it less often for the results you want Mix good fertilizer with less expensive one Get more volume and still a good amount of quality for less money than going all high quality Share equipment with neighbors Might get aggravating but this will save the renting and purchasing cost of a lot of needed equipment One day you will need something you don’t want to purchase so this will save all that unneeded hassle. Rent instead of buy Most major money draining equipment will not be needed for more than a specified project you have set out so renting saves a lot of money No maintenance on the equipment No need for storage places for equipment Do not hire companies for landscaping jobs Companies can be very expensive charging over $15 an hour There are so many young adults around the neighborhood looking for part time jobs that will work as hard for a lot less cost Young adults don’t have long term contracts and are a lot more convenient for spur of the moment jobs Example: vacation grass cutting, general landscaping, weekend project help

Create a Lawn care Business

Bob Therrien asked:


#1 Time management “systems” often fail because they are born of perfectionism and unrealistic expectations.

For instance, some people don’t initiate a time management approach until they’re already falling behind in their work; they undertake time management as a means of catching up.

Their initial plans tend to cram in everything they have to do without appropriate regard for the time required. The unrealistic plans that emerge from “catch-up time management” amount to little more than an expression of renewed motivation for change but without the structure to support it.

Those who try to follow crammed schedules often fall seriously behind their intended pace and abandon the plan altogether, resulting in continued time trouble. Some conclude somehow that these strategies of planning don’t work for them.

But, what is important isn’t being perfect, it is making and using a plan that helps you accomplish your goals. One of your best options for time management systems is to begin with the process of goal setting to establish a context for managing time.

I find that I have to stay on top of lots of different types of news and content that fit with the different types of people that I meet. My company pulled together a website for me that pull’s in RSS feeds, news and articles for dozens of different topics. I go to http://info.trainingpass.com for a few minutes when ever I need to quickly study up on subjects. This saves me time, I don’t have to search. It’s in one place for me.

What’s your business plan? Even if you don’t own a business lets assume that your life needs to be run efficiently and organized and that you need a return on investment (ROI). Step one is goals, both long term (5 years) and short term (1 year). Let’s get started. Stop reading this article whenever you need too. First you need to create a sheet with 2 columns and 2 rows. Label the columns professional and the other personal, then the rows under them should be labeled long term and short term. Know what you want to achieve in life. Remember balance in life as well. Do your goals include exercise, financial, career, education, entertainment, religion, charity? List all that fit. Make sure that each goal is clear, positive and achievable. But, reach and grow, don’t set the goals to low. Remember and learn to celebrate your success too. As you achieve these goals take time to enjoy the satisfaction of your achievements.

This section of the program should take a few days. Get started on your goal list today, come back and visit it a couple of times to really make it the best that you can. After you have revisited it a few times now prioritize and number the list in the order that is most important for you to achieve over all success. Adjust how you think about time, improve your awareness of how you use time, and make change for peak performance. As you encounter time troubles, keep in mind that some are predictable, some are not; some are controllable, some are not. For those that are not controllable, keep your cool and get back on track as soon as possible. For time troubles that you can control, and particularly those that occur predictably, deal with them directly and forcefully so that they don’t prevent you from achieving your goals. Examine the following list of troubles: the tips and strategies associated with each one can help you shift your time back to your goals.

Procrastination often emerges as a means of distancing oneself from stressful activities. If you’re overwhelmed by the volume of work on your to-do list, you might benefit from making a “one-item list”: re-write the top item from your list at the top of a blank page and work the task to completion, then repeat.

It can be difficult to start working. Most of the time, however, not starting seems to be related to fear of poor results or negative evaluations than it is to the actual difficulty of the work. Aim to subdivide tasks into small steps and convince yourself that to get started all you need is 10 full minutes working on a task. Often, the 10 minutes will elapse and you’ll be right into the swing of things, prepared to continue on productively.

#2 The next phase of the system involves tracking time and developing awareness for where you spend your time.

How do you currently spend your time? You need to know. For the next week you need to keep a log of what your whole day looks like. Take a notebook and make notes all during the day. Also make a note in the logs about your moods. Don’t rely on your memory, that doesn’t work very well. After the week is over you’ll need to really dive into the log and split the entries into professional and personal. You might be surprised as to how much time is spent on reading junk mail, and chatting with the office chatterers or doing less than organized activities. It’s interesting to compare your energy levels when you review the logs. Productivity may be tied into your eating habits. Now how much is your time worth? Take your pay or if you’re at home, what your pay should be and divide it per hour, ½ hour and each 15 minute section. Examine the log and how much does it cost for you to deal with that junk mail or chatting and being social in non-productive discussions? Of course we all realize that we are human, and need social interaction. This is just a guide of what time management means in terms of costs. Here’s where your return on investment is important. You’ll return to this log to restructure your day.

#3 The third phase of the cycle is plan making, and this could include making to-do lists, weekly plans, monthly plans and longer-range plans.

Your new plan. Using the log to analyze your time you’ll now need to see where you can improve on your time management. Remembering the goals that you created in step one as a guide, we need to start using a to do list. You’ll need to revisit your master goals list several times during the year. Those goals are not carved in stone and can be changed as your life becomes more organized. Many people talk about multi-tasking, but be sure that you schedule quality time to complete your tasks completely. Your to-do list is your business plan of essential tasks for the week or for the day. Set time aside just once per day to process your postal mail, set time to read and responded to e-mail, unless you are in a service position that requires it more than once. As you look at the tasks that you need to schedule think about if this is a task that you enjoy and are you good at it? Are there some tasks that just should not be on your to do list? Would your personal ROI be better served if you showed someone else how to do this task? This is important because you will be more effective on the important tasks that fit your role in the organization and or family. It will also increase your satisfaction of a day well spent. Your new business plan should concentrate on your strengths and tasks that really matter to your job and home life and support the goals that you identified in step 1. In order for you to do this well you may need to review your job description purpose and meet with others to learn what is most important in increasing your value to them. How would you be able to exceed expectations? Consider this as you create your to do list. What are the most important deadlines? Are you part of a team and how does your time management skills relate to projects. You should know if there are resources and budgets available to you to support exceeding the expectations. If you manage people or are a family caregiver this all needs to be scheduled. This is a lot to consider and should be done over a period of time, perhaps a week. But, don’t procrastinate. Let’s get it done. Time management is important. What type of to do list will work best for you? Choose either a weekly or daily list based on the method that will be most effective for your management style. As you create your list consider that:

1. It makes sense that the person with the time, skill, talent and knowledge does each job. Bear in mind however that one person can not do everything.

2. Teach the person how to do the job, including shortcuts.

• Have the best tools, supplies, and equipment for doing the job.

• Consider what jobs people already do.

• Never re-do a job (unless health and/or safety is threatened). If you do, you’ll get the job back.

• Realize others may not meet your standards, but if you have truly given up the job, accept that your standards no longer apply.

• Praise people; let them know their work is appreciated.

3. There are plenty of people who would enjoy being paid for a job you would rather not do.

4. Apply the motto “Less is Best,” so you have fewer possessions to manage. Evaluate if the world will come to an end if the job just does not get done.

Divide your goals into time frames – and then subdivide into manageable pieces.

While it may seem challenging to take in the whole scope of that convergent goal, thinking of your goals in this way helps to reinforce the idea that there is a connected path linking what actions you take today and the successful completion of your goals.

Seeing these connections can help you monitor your own progress and detect whether you are on track or not.

The final phase of the cycle is time shifting and adjusting (i.e., changing where you spend your time to better match your intended use of time) in which you make corrections to the system before starting the cycle again at goal setting.

Taken together, these phases permit you to initialize a process of gradual, performance-based improvement in time management skill.

Everybody wants the “quick fix”, but the complexity of changes involved in really getting a grip on your time management process will take some time to move through.

Resist the urge to cast aside strategies that don’t promise instant results; like it or not, change takes time.

Now make the to – do list. Once your list is complete prioritize the list using numbers where #1 is most important. As you implement your new business plan start with most important. If at the end you don’t get to do the least important tasks examine how important they are and if you are the right person to be doing the task. Can you and should you delegate that duty?

#4 Now that you have your list created use technology and tools. How do you schedule your time? Do you use a calendar, a daily, weekly, monthly planner? Do you use computer software, pda, or smart gadget? If you have these tools but don’t know how or do not use them, make time on your list for this learning. If your life is fast paced or stressful, remember to allow time for balance. For many people, sports are a fun activity. We created a fun website that’s a sports portal for when you only have a few minutes. http://www.adventurezonesports.com

If you need a walk or workout time schedule this, don’t try to do it while you’re eating lunch! Quality time management includes:

Physical (exercise, nutrition, sleep)

Intellectual (cultural, aesthetic)

Social (intimate and social relationships)

Career (school and career goal directed work)

Emotional (expression of feelings, desires)

Spiritual (quest for meaning)

It is important to keep in mind that the purpose of scheduling is not to enslave you to your planner, but rather to record your decisions about when certain things should happen.

The weekly objective list is a to-do list with additional features to further decompose tasks into smaller units and to record time estimates for the task.

Construct your plan to follow a rhythm.

Pick a time each week to plan your schedule. Even with unexpected occurrences that can impact your schedule you assist yourself in making decisions that are governed by your desire to reach your goals.

Once your week is planned you will experience clarity of focus, your tendency to be distracted will be reduced and you will be certain of your reasons for doing the things you had planned. Committing yourself to a plan you’ve made represents a renewal of your motivation for the goals and tends to increase your time on task.

#5 The last phase of the system is self-monitoring your action. Self monitoring involves paying attention to how well you are working your plan, how accurately you have planned, how well you have forecasted for various events and so on

For many people motivation isn’t a prerequisite to action…it is a result of it!

You’ll spend a lot of your time waiting in lines. At the library check-out, waiting for the bus, waiting for the light to turn green at an intersection, buying tickets, and even waiting for the professor to arrive at class… you find yourself just waiting. If you carry around a book, some photocopied reports, spreadsheets, your pda smart gadget with this MP3 management program you could be actively using time that would otherwise escape you. Plan ahead with an activity to fill this empty time.

The key to commuting time is, simply, use it or lose it. Books on tape or MP3 training are a wonderful way to multitask if you are driving, or if you are riding, the list is endless of little chores that can be accomplished. The challenge is to use that time for something productive.

Helpful tips:

OFFICE

When chatterers show up unannounced in your office be firm but polite. Suggest that you wish you had time to chat right now but absolutely do not. You realize that it’s important to get together and take your calendar out and suggest a time that might work for you because with your new time management program right now you have something scheduled.

Always putting out fires? Maybe others in your office or family need to learn how to have better time management. Chaos is normally due to poor planning. Offer to schedule a team time management planning session.

FOOD

Develop and use a rotating menu system which can include complete meals or just main dishes.

Photocopy a master shopping list so you just have to check off needed items.

Buy and cook in quantity.

Do only one large shopping trip each month for basics and staples?

Prepare quick and easy but nutritious breakfasts only.

Use food preparation and storage equipment to the maximum such as a slow cooker, freezer, microwave, food processor, and pressure saucepan.

Prepare as much in advance as possible such as lunches the night before and quantity cooking on the weekends.

Get everyone in the habit of rinsing dishes immediately after use.

CLOTHES

All family members above the age of three put away their own laundry.

Multiple hampers or baskets coded for the type of washing machine settings such as “warm wash, cold rinse” or “cold wash, cold rinse” cuts sorting time.

Locate laundry near the bathroom or the kitchen.

Put away coats, boots, etc. as soon as possible when entering the house.

Make it a house rule that what goes into the laundry basket inside out, gets washed and dried inside out — socks, underwear, T-shirts, etc.

HOUSE

Set Friday night or Saturday morning as house cleaning time for everyone.

Develop a flexible cleaning schedule so everything eventually gets done.

All family members over the age of three are responsible for their own bedrooms.

Use shelves instead of cabinets or drawers for storage; it’s easier to put something away if you don’t have to open a drawer or door.

In each room have either all or no carpeting.

Decorate with darker colors especially in high traffic areas

Use quilts or sleeping bags for easier bed making.

Wipe the bathroom sink after each use.

Clean the tub or shower before you get out of it.

Make the bed right after you get up.

Use throw rugs with rubber backs in heavy traffic areas.

Change filters on the heating/cooling system frequently to cut down on the amount of house dust.

Keep multiple sets of cleaning supplies and equipment especially if the house has more than one level.

YARD

Simplify landscaping; consolidate several flower beds into a large one.

Use low maintenance plantings.

Keep lawn care equipment in top-notch working order.

CAR

Schedule the next routine car service appointment each time you pick up the car left for servicing.

Develop a car care calendar for routine service and seasonal maintenance.

Use a master calendar to schedule chauffeuring of family members.

SHOPPING

Run several errands at the same time.

Have a morning “launching pad” as a place to collect backpacks, briefcases, papers, money, etc. the night before.

Carry a list of current sizes for everyone in the household when shopping. Do as much routine shopping (bedding, underwear, footwear, etc.) as possible by telephone or mail.

Buy an entire season’s clothing in one trip.

Buy duplicates of gifts, cards, etc.

Organize important papers and records in a filing system.

Use “sticky notes” on the bathroom mirror or by the door to remind someone of something they tend to forget, or use magnets to hold notes on metal surfaces.



Lawn Care Business Marketing Plan

Jeffrey Seymour asked:


Keeping your landscape plantings, flower beds, and nursery crops free of weeds is a battle, but if you approach it with a strategic plan, you will prevail. In order to develop a plan, you first must understand how weeds work, and what kind of weeds you are dealing with.

Basically weeds grow either from seed, or they reproduce from their roots. As the roots grow outward from the parent plant, new plants sprout up from the lateral roots, creating more parent plants and the process continues and the weeds thrive. Weeds that tend to reproduce from the root are usually more difficult to control.

Weed control facts? Weeds are plants, and they function just like the desirable plants in your yard. They need water, sunlight, and nutrition to survive. Of these three key survival needs, the easiest one for a gardener to eliminate is sunlight. Through proper mulching you can eliminate the sunlight.

But first, let’s look at the steps you should go through before you mulch, then we’ll discuss the best mulching techniques to use. In order for your weed control efforts to be truly effective, you should do everything in your power to make your gardens as weed free as possible before you plant or mulch. There are a couple of ways you can go about this, either organically or with chemicals. I don’t like using chemicals, but I do use them for weed control, and I use them for pest control when necessary.

I’ll discuss organic control first. The first thing you should do is remove all unwanted vegetation from your planting area. Using a hoe, spade or other digging device, undercut the roots and remove the undesirable plants, roots and all. Then you should work the soil by rototilling or turning the soil by hand.

Once worked, let the soil sit for four days or so, and work it again. Keep doing this over and over as long as time permits. This process serves two purposes. It brings the roots that were left in the soil close to the surface so they can be dried by the sun, which will make them non-viable, and it disturbs the weed seeds that have started to germinate, which makes them non-viable as well. The longer you continue this process the more weeds you are eliminating from your garden.

Weed control facts? Depending on the time of the year, there are a few billion weed seeds drifting through the air at any given time, so to think that you can eventually rid a garden of weed seed is false thinking, but at least this process is effective for the remaining roots, which are the most difficult to control.

With that process complete, go ahead and plant your garden. When you’re done planting you can either mulch the bed, or keep turning the soil on a weekly basis to keep it free of weeds. Most people opt to mulch. Not only does mulch help to control the weeds, but if you select a natural mulch it also adds organic matter to the soil which makes for better gardening results down the road.

Before mulching you can spread newspaper (7-9 layers thick) over the soil and place the mulch over top of that. The newspaper will block the sunlight from reaching the surface of the soil and help to keep weed growth to a minimum. The newspaper will eventually decompose, and not permanently alter the make up of your garden. Paper grocery bags also work well, so the next time you hear, “Paper or Plastic?”, you’ll know how to answer.

What about black plastic, or the weed barrier fabric sold at garden centers? I don’t like either and I’ll tell you why. For one, neither one of them ever go away, and the make up of your garden is forever altered until you physically remove them, which is a real pain in the butt.

Weed control facts? Plastic is no good for the soil because soil needs to breathe. Plastic blocks the transfer of water and oxygen, and eventually your soil will suffer, as will your garden. It’s all right to use plastic in a vegetable garden as long as you remove it at the end of the season and give the soil a chance to breathe.

Weed barrier fabrics allow the soil to breathe, but what happens is that when you mulch over top of the fabric, which you should because the fabric is ugly, the mulch decomposes and becomes topsoil. Weeds love topsoil, and they will grow like crazy in it. Only problem is, they are growing on top of the fabric, and you are stuck with a ton of problems, like a weedy garden, and a major job of trying to remove the fabric that is now firmly anchored in place because the weeds have rooted through it.

Weed fabric is also porous enough that if an area becomes exposed to the sunlight, enough light will peek through and weeds below the fabric will grow, pushing their way through the fabric. I don’t like the stuff. I’ve removed miles of it from landscapes for other people because it did not work as they had expected.

Weed control facts? Controlling weeds with chemicals is fairly easy, and very effective if done properly. I know that many people don’t approve of chemical weed controls, but millions of people use them, so I might as well tell you how to get the most effect using them.

There are two types of chemical weed controls, post-emergent, and pre-emergent. In a nutshell, a post-emergent herbicide kills weeds that are actively growing. A pre-emergent prevents weed seeds from germinating. Of the post- emergent herbicides there are both selective and non-selective herbicides. A selective herbicide is like the herbicides that are in weed-and-feed type lawn fertilizers. The herbicide will kill broad leaf weeds in your lawn, but it doesn’t harm the grass.

One of the most popular non-selective herbicides is Round-up(r), it pretty much kills any plant it touches. Rule number one. Read the labels and follow the safety precautions!!! Round-up(r) is very effective if used properly, but first you must understand how it works.

Round-up(r) must be sprayed on the foliage of the plant, where it is absorbed, then translocated to the root system where it then kills the plant. It takes about 72 hours for the translocation process to completely take place, so you don’t want to disturb the plant at all for at least 72 hours after it has been sprayed.

After 72 hours you can dig, chop, rototill, and pretty much do as you please because the herbicide has been translocated throughout the plant. The manufacture claims that Round-up(r) does not have any residual effect, which means that you can safely plant in an area where Round-up(r) has been used. However, I would not use it in a vegetable garden without researching further.

No residual effect also means that Round-up(r) has no effect whatsoever on weed seeds, so there is absolutely no benefit to spraying the soil. Only spray the foliage of the weeds you want to kill. Be careful of over spray drifting to your desirable plants. To prevent spray drift I adjust the nozzle of my sprayer so that the spray droplets are larger and heavier, and less likely to be carried by the wind. I also keep the pressure in the tank lower by only pumping the tank a minimum number of strokes. Just enough to deliver the spray.

Buy a sprayer that you can use as a dedicated sprayer for Round-up(r) only. Never use a sprayer that you have used for herbicides for any other purpose. Once you have sprayed the weeds, waited 72 hours and then removed them, you can go ahead and plant. Mulching is recommended as described above. To keep weed seeds from germinating you can apply a pre-emergent herbicide.

Depending on the brand, some of them are applied over top of the mulch, and some are applied to the soil before the mulch is applied. A pre-emergent herbicide creates a vapor barrier at the soil level that stops weed seed germination, and can be very effective at keeping your gardens weed free. They usually only last about 5 or 6 months and need to be re-applied.

Visit a full service garden center and seek the advice of a qualified professional to select the pre-emergent herbicide that will best meet your needs. Never use a pre-emergent herbicide in your vegetable garden, and be careful around areas where you intend to sow grass seed. If you spill a little in an area where you intend to plant grass, the grass will not grow. They really do work.



Create a Lawn care Business

Darrell F asked:


Think about fertilising your lawn a final time before the ground freezes. This will be important to grow beautiful grass in the spring. You’ll want to time this just right. Get out your Farmer’s Almanac to get an idea of the best time to fertilise your lawn. Ask at your gardening center the best type of fertiliser to use on your lawn, as it can depend on your area.

Begin to cut your lawn shorter as you approach winter. It is best to go through winter with a very short lawn. Most often we are shoveling snow off of our lawns and you’ll find that a well-kept lawn is very important after the first snow fall. It can be very hard to shovel snow with longer grass mixed in.

This is also the ideal time to organize your children’s backyard equipment and get rid of what they are not using. Perhaps the children have out-grown their playground equipment. This is the ideal time to take it apart and put it out for pick up. You’ll want to enter fall with a tidy and organized lawn. Sometimes Santa has a way of bringing new background play equipment too, and getting rid of the old now can be very helpful.

Prepare your winter lawn care materials. Get the snow blower out and have your local garage test and make sure it is working. Make sure you have snow shovels and ice melt. Check to make sure you have heavy duty winter gloves. Check your garage for antifreeze to start your car in case it freezes over. Make sure you have covers for the cars to keep snow off them. This is the perfect time to get these materials ready, before everyone else is in line for them. If you need to buy them, you’ll also be paying a much more reasonable cost for them – not the higher prices of winter!

Get out the seed and bulb catalogues and start to plan your lawn care for the coming spring. You’ll want to get your order in early and now is the perfect time to start planning what you’ll want to do. The seed and bulb catalogs most often arrive now because they know people want to plan and plot out their lawn maintenance on their spring gardens. Take a look and start to decide exactly what you’ll want to do.

 



Lawn Care Business Marketing Plan

Paul Duxbury asked:


I am sure you have heard it said that we don’t appreciate something until it’s gone! When you think about water it’s probably one of those things that like me you take for granted because it is always there! However when it comes to caring for our lawns we suddenly become very aware of the importance of water when we are faced with any form of drought which leads to such things as a sprinkler ban! If you find yourself in a drought, there are some things you can do to help conserve water and make the best use of what you have available.

If you have not already mulched your plants, do it! Mulch will help limit the amount of water that evaporates from the soil. While organic mulches such as grass clippings or wood chips are preferable since they add organic matter to the soil, plastic mulches are useful in limiting evaporation from the soil. They can be laid between rows in the vegetable garden and will help limit moisture loss; however, they also will limit infiltration.

Place your water where it will do the most good. Sprinklers are very inefficient for getting water to the roots of your plants. Much of the water lands on the leaves and evaporates before reaching the ground. A slow gentle watering at the base of the plants, allowing the water to soak into the soil, will be most efficient.

Water those plants needing it most. Newly planted trees, shrubs, and flowers with limited roots systems will most likely suffer first from drought conditions. Give these plants priority if water is scarce. Well-established plants, especially those native to the area, are likely to withstand drought conditions with limited damage.

Water in the early morning before the heat of the day. This limits evaporation and supplies plants with needed moisture to make it through the hot, sunny day.

Consider using drip or trickle irrigation systems. Many inexpensive, easy to install systems are available that provide small amounts of water to the base of individual plants. These systems place the water where it is needed most, rather than applying it across the whole garden. Check with your local garden center.

Collect water from downspouts when it rains. Roofs intercept significant amounts of rain. Collecting this runoff into a barrel can help limit the use of water during dry spells.

It’s essential that you have access to plenty of water when caring for your lawn and your plants. Therefore ensuring that you take advantage of any ways to conserve water is essential.



Start a Lawn Care Business A Whole New Way!

Backyard Enthusiast asked:


Anyone who has lived in one place for any length of time often finds themselves accumulating things over the years, and not quite knowing where to put them. Tools are a big problem too. You find yourself with all sorts of tools for gardening, lawn care, small home projects, hobbies and more.

A lot of the most common tools people use to care for and maintain their homes are not easy to store. And often these tools get quite dirty, so we don’t relish the idea of putting them in the house somewhere. And the garage of course, assuming you have one, is usually piled high with all sorts of other things. Boxes of keepsakes, old clothes and toys, cars, bicycles, and all the things we keep around to maintain those too.

So there isn’t often much room at all in the garage for storing the tools you’ve accumulated over the years. And if you do try to store them there, you often find that you spend more time hunting for those tools than you do actually using them!

And that’s what makes outdoor tool sheds such a useful invention. In fact, tool sheds don’t have to be placed outdoors either. You can buy smaller cabinet style tool sheds to place in the garage if you have room for instance, and it will still be a huge help because all of your tools will be organized and easy to find when you need them.

Outdoor tool sheds are quite useful too though, particularly if you don’t have an indoor space to place even small tool sheds. If you need more space, the outdoor tool sheds become even more useful too.

In fact, outdoor tool sheds are used for a wide variety of purposes. If you do a lot of gardening for instance, you can use the tool shed to store all of your gardening tools and supplies. Small pruning shears, extra potting soil and fertilizer, and even extra container pots all fit very easily into the smaller sized tool sheds.

If you have larger gardening equipment such as hedge trimmers, weed wackers, bulk bags of mulch or fertilizer, hoes, shovels, rakes, and tree limb cutters, there are plenty of larger sized tool sheds which will allow you to fit all of that in with room to spare.

Guys who like doing woodworking or various household chores can share the tool shed, or have one of their own too. Then there’s room for the various saws, sanders, drills and so on that seem to always being laying around just out of reach.

Not only do tool sheds come in a variety of sizes, they also come in a wide variety of materials too. You can get tool sheds made of wood, metal, and even vinyl too. Some come pre-painted, or you can choose to paint it yourself so that the tool shed matches your house design.

Regardless of what kind of tool shed you choose to get though, once you have the tools all organized, protected from the weather, and easy to find in one place, you’ll wonder why you waited so long to get one.



Lawn Care Business Marketing Plan

Andrew Caxton asked:


How to get a perfect lawn is what most homeowners wish to know. An excellent turf is not easily won. There are many determinants that influence into a healthy soil. It is not only to thoroughly care for the lawn, by mowing, trimming and irrigating, but you have to feed it too. Feeding the soil is more important than you may think. However, you have to start from choosing the soil that more suits with your yard. A typical mistake of many beginners is to have a non-ideal soil, which will carry important troubles afterwards.

 

Understanding the basics of lawn growing, which are basically water and nutrients is not enough. It depends on more than these factors. What you should do first, is to make a study to evaluate your ground situation, and then select the proper soil. In order to allow watering and fertilizing the lawn as it should be, your must choose a soil equipped to capture fertilizers and water adequately. Keep clear in mind that the ground is the lifeline of your lawn, it is impossible to keep a healthy lawn with an unhealthy soil.

 

Complete Lawn Care With Soil Conditioners

 

Soil conditioners and amendments are products to complement the ground watering and fertilizing. They may improve the quality of the ground, if added adequately and regularly. Soil amendments are used exclusively for sandy and clay soil. To break up the clay is the principal advantage of using ground amendments, when featuring clay grounds.Sandy soils can not retain nutrients and water very well. Thus they need an amendments to help with drainage related things. Back again to clay soils and thinking on more solutions. Roots might have a hard time to expand properly with clay grounds, looking for and digging in for nutrients underground. A practical solution may be to mix some wood chips, bark or peat into the yard soil. This will allow better water and air circulation, just by breaking it up.

 

 

Using Preventative Herbicides To Fight Weeds

 

 

Once the lawn has been planted, installed and mowed at least four times, then you are ready to start applying herbicides. First of all apply a pre-emergent herbicide to treat weed seeds. Pre-emergent will prevent wider weed infestations. This type of solution needs a very short grass to reach the seeds easier. However, pre-herbicides will not save your lawn from seeds. You need then to apply post-herbicides to keep them out of the grass.

 

 

No matter what kind of grass features your yard, the lawn care season lasts the whole year. However, since there are many different kinds of grass, there are also a different growing season for every single type. That’s why you must start fertilizing your lawn at the beginning of every growing season. Remember the date of the first fertilizing, and repeat at the same date for the next years coming.

 

 

Lawn care fertilizers come in many different types. Working with fertilizers may be extremely dangerous due to their chemical components. Therefore, they must be treated carefully. Your lawn might get even burned if not applied adequately, so read the instructions manual before start working. Chemical fertilizers can simply be replaced by organic fertilizers for safety reasons. Organics are currently, the most suitable alternative for any kind of grass. Further information on lawn care at http://www.lawn-mowers-and-garden-tractors.com.

How To Build Auto Lawn Sprinklers

John Smith asked:


Are you a business entrepreneur in search of solutions for your small scale business but frustrated at not being able to find what you need quickly? Whether searching for business success, piece of mind or both, you will get it all here. Read on further.

If you are stressed about the deadlines, burdened with tiring paperwork or your employees are driving you nut’s, it’s high time to bring about some change. Instead of struggling to keep your business afloat in such a scenario why not opt for a better solution. How about the simplest and most effective, job scheduler, customer management and accounts software available. Small Business Software is one solution for everything.

The software is designed for people with skills in businesses like garden & lawn care, clearing, pool care, hair & beauty care, dog groomers, ferries, handy man, pest control, mobile car services. Below is an introduction about some of the software’s we provide.

Personal Trainer Business Software – Personal Training is a business just like any other business. There are invoice to record, bills to pay and taxes to file. Personal trainer business software is no longer a convenience tool, but a must-have necessity. Lawn Care Scheduling Software – Scheduling & billing repetitive jobs is tedious and time consuming. Lawn Care Software simplifies the task of scheduling your lawn care jobs and billing your customers. Small Business Accounting Software – Highly automated accounting software that manages and maintains the Company’s financial accounting information in the easiest way. Being professional and easy working, the accounting software is ready to meet requirements of all types of business and trading houses. SMS direct Invoicing Software – PC to Mobile Text Messaging Software is capable to send bulk text SMS to individual or group in one single click. All the business and social organizations can effectively send text messages to family, friends, and employees for only 10c each – Less than half the price as from your phone!

Even if you are not interested in availing for our software you can subscribe for free monthly newsletter. It is a short, simple and informative mail that is in line with our business mission. It encloses: -

* Latest Software Tips & Updates

* A short article for success in small business

* List of best business services we’ve found

* A few headlines of articles effecting small businesses.

* A great quote

* And a good Joke to add some cheer to your day

With over 10 years of experience watch out our Software for Small Business experts reveal key tools and techniques, we stress on business apps that can save small businesses resources. We would show you how business intelligence systems can deliver on productivity and customer satisfaction with virtually no extra investment.

If you are interested to know more about Lawn Care Scheduling Software, please search our site for more in-depth information and resources.



How To Build Auto Lawn Sprinklers