GardenBanter.co.uk - View Single Post - Scotts Weed Control Fertilizer Killed Our Lawn!! HELP!!!

enigma · 01-07-2009, 05:32 PM posted to rec.gardens

(MICHELLE H.) wrote in
:

Every year, we try to do the cycle of Scotts Fertilizers on our
lawn ( Crabgrass Fertilizer, Weed Control Fertilizer,
Summerguard Fertilizer, Regular Fertilizer, and Winterguard
Fertilizer), and usually have no problems.

lovely. a chemical dependant unnatural lawn...

Because its so late into June, we were going to just skip the
"Weed Control", and just do the "Summerguard", but we opted to
still do the "Weed Control", because our lawn was OVERRUN by
clovers this year.

did you know that until the mid-1950s, when the chemical companies
developed broad leaf weed killers, clover was considered the *most*
desirable lawn? not grass. clover.
unfortunately, the new weed killers killed clover, so the chemical
companies started an ad campaign telling everyone that clover was
an "undesirable weed" and in order to have a pretty green lawn,
everyone should buy their poisons. it was a good ad campaign, at
least for the chemical companies. not so good for the birds, or
insects or pets or children that played on the poison lawns... but
they were pretty, right? so what if you can use them.

We usually have clover throughout the yard every year, but this
year was the WORST, and we have never seen it this bad!!!! On
one side of our house, where we use to have nice grass, the
clover spread like wild, and the whole side of the house was
just one big field of clover. When you walked on the side of the
house, you weren't walking on grass, you were walking on pure
clover.

aw, what a pity...
i am happy to see clover. it means my yard is healthy.

But anyway, we watered the grass to get it nice and wet ( so
that the fertilizer sticks to the weeds ), just like the bag
instructs, and we set our "drop spreader" to the 5 1/2 setting
like the bag says, and applied the fertilizer.

yeah, but you didn't read the part about temperature, did you?

The clover started to turn Brown, and slowly die off, but the
grass was all Yellow the next morning!!! Now all the neighbors
have nice Green lawns, and our lawn is all Yellow.

see my tiny violin?
i bet all that grass you killed will be overrun with weeds now,
and not of the desirable clover either.

So, did the Scotts "Weed Control" kill the lawn??

no, you did. you didn't read the instructions.

So is there any truth to the above two explanations?? And now
the important thing, how do we fix/repair the lawn??? According
to the "Scotts" bag, you CAN'T put down new grass seed until 4
weeks after applying the "Weed Control"???

well, you could, but it won't grow. just leave it until fall &
reseed then. a yellow lawn is really a small price to pay for NOT
FOLLOWING DIRECTIONS.
you might even consider seeding it with clover. think of the time
& money you would save...

What if we were to spread around some new topsoil ( Topdressing
I think they call it? ) first, and then reseed?? Or do we have
to wait the full 4 weeks???

topdressing isn't going to help. bringing in 3-4 *inches* of new
topsoil might let you reseed sooner, but reseeding this time of
year is going to gain you mostly weeds anyway.

We have watered the lawn "deeply" for the past couple of days,
but that didn't really help. The grass is still all Yellow.

yup... and by "deeply", how many inches of water? you are probably
just compounding the stress of poisoning it by drowning the
remainder.

Any help and or suggestions about what to do now would greatly
be appreciated!!!

neh, i bet my suggestions aren't at all appreciated.
my lawn is nicely green. it's mostly clover & strawberries... i
don't have to mow it much, pamper it, poison it, or water it. i
don't have to worry about my child or pets being poisoned by
playing on it. i'm not a slave to it.
lee