Plan Your Fertilizer Schedule to Achieve Excellent Results

By planning a fertilizer schedule, you can find the best time to fertilize your garden, lawn, or plants. This is why a lot of people often ask the same question: “When it is the best time to fertilize?”

However, there isn’t an exact answer to this question since it depends on four basic factors: weather, the grass type, the fertilizer itself, and how you want your garden to look afterwards. Here is some information on how you can plan a fertilizer schedule to fertilize your garden every year.

General Information

For those who love to have a beautiful lawn in their gardens, you should make it a point to fertilize your lawn four to five times a year. Otherwise, if you are not so dedicated, try to fertilize your lawn at least twice a year, which is the bare minimum for the grass to continue growing.

In addition, each type of grass or plant must be fertilized during its growing season, and it is better to apply the fertilizer during active growth.

Cool Season Grasses

This grass type generally has two growing periods. The first one is just after the winter dormancy period and grows just after the heavy storms of winter. The other period is early fall when the weather starts to cool off and the hot air and droughts are gone. During this second period, it is recommended to apply a fertilizer that is rich in nitrogen, which will help the lawn to prepare for the cold weather.

Warm Season Grasses

As the name implies, warm season grasses grow during the summer months. These grasses can resist the summer heat only if they are fertilized in spring. Otherwise, there will not be enough nutrients and the lawn will start to lose its color.

Warm season grasses must also be fertilized during late summer months especially in September. Similar to the cool season ones, these grasses also need a lot of nitrogen during early spring, so use a fertilizer with a large percentage of nitrogen to fertilize the land.

The Dormant Period

The vast majority of trees and grasses have their dormant period in which they rest for a certain amount of time. It is important not to apply any fertilizer during this period since the nitrogen in it can encourage weed growth instead of nutrifying the tree or lawn, so during a long cold winter, do not hesitate to modify your fertilizing schedule since it makes no difference for the lawn and trees on which day they get fertilized.

Avoid Hot Weather

When a fertilizer is applied, it needs to be watered each day until it dissolves and starts to settle down in the soil, so if it doesn’t remain moist, the fertilizer will eventually burn the plants or lawn instead of helping them. Thus, it’s better to avoid fertilizing during a drought, such as in August, and delay your application until the hot weather is over.