WITH spring finally here, if you want to ensure your lawn looks lush, you’ve come to the right place.
There’s nothing more unsightly than enjoying time in the garden on a warm day, only to be faced with ugly brown patches on your grass.
Gardening pros have sworn by a 1p trick to ensure your lawn looks lush for spring[/caption]
So if your grass is covered in weeds and brown patches you simply can’t shift, you’ll need to take notes[/caption]
With this hack, you’ll need to use your old tea bags[/caption]
It’ll keep your lawn looking fresh and save space in your food bin[/caption]
But luckily, now you can say goodbye to that and hello to a gorgeous green lawn – and there’s barely any effort involved.
Not only this, but thanks to this super simple trick, you won’t have to go out and break the bank on posh fertilisers or gardening products.
In fact, with this expert-approved hack, it’ll cost you less than 1p a go – yes, you heard that correctly.
Alongside mowing your grass, lawns require fertilising to promote strong and healthy growth.
While you can turn to store-bought garden fertilisers for this, which average at around £10 each, experts have raved about a much cheaper, natural alternative – and it’ll even free up space in your food bin too.
Experts have suggested sprinkling used tea leaves on your lawn to help promote strong and healthy growth.
Tea leaves, which are normally thrown into a food bin and wasted, act as an effective natural fertiliser as they contain essential nutrients like nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium, which are all vital for healthy plant and grass growth.
As well as this, tea leaves can also help to improve the structure and water retention of your soil, which in turn will create better growing conditions for your grass and help to improve its overall appearance.
Lawn Love explained: “Compost tea isn’t a warm drink to savour by the crackling fire. But your lawn (and your garden plants) would love to glug some down.
“According to the New Jersey Agricultural Experiment Station, applying compost tea to the lawn helps spread beneficial microbes onto soil and plants.
“Compost tea also helps protect your turf from disease. The organisms in compost tea will consume available food sources and help outcompete disease organisms.
“The homemade fertiliser increases soil water retention, too.”
March gardening jobs
The Sun’s Gardening Editor, Veronica Lorraine has shared the first gardening jobs of spring.
Start sowing seeds
You can plant Aubergine seeds into propagator – or outdoors after the last frost. Or you could try growbags in a coldframe – and hopefully you can harvest from August onwards.
Have a think about planting some different varieties of seeds this year – check out She Grows Veg and other sites for heirloom varieties. There’s an astonishing array on offer, like purple carrots, globe-shaped aubergines, lime green cauliflower or storage tomatoes that stay fresh for months.
Buy and plant summer bulbs
Summer flowering bulbs provide huge big blousey blooms – with some bringing a real touch of the tropics to your garden. Try Gladioli, dahlias, calla lilies, peonies and crocosmia.
Lawncare starts now!
Start your lawn care with a boosting high nitrogen spring feed, reseed any bare patches – and you’ll probably start mowing regularly in earnest this month. If you can – keep a corner long to help wildlife.
Check compost
Dig well rotting compost into your soil. If you have the space, it’s even worth digging trenches and chucking in your rotting veg that’s usually destined for the recycling bin – then cover. It adds great nutrients for free.
Clean outside spaces
Time to blast your patios and paths with a pressure washer – if your children are responsible enough it’s a great job for them – they’ll get soaked and have fun at the same time.
Soak sweet peas
Soak your sweet peas before sowing into long narrow pots or toilet rolls – put two seeds in a pot. These can go in an unheated greenhouse – and when there’s three or four pairs of leaves, pinch out the growing tip which will make them grow outward instead of upwards.
Create a wildflower meadow
Sow a wildflower meadow – if you have room. A lot of shops now sell wildflower mixes to make things easier – or even seed bombs which can just be scattered onto the soil.
So if you have nasty brown patches on your lawn that need repairing, experts suggest covering such patches with used tea leaves and planting the grass seed within this.
The nutrients from the tea will seep into the soil so when your grass grows back it will be healthier and greener.
The organisms in compost tea will consume available food sources and help outcompete disease organisms
Lawn Love
But that’s not all, as an added bonus, tea bags can also inhibit the growth of weeds, particularly if steeped in black tea.
So if you have pesky weeds in your lawn that just simply won’t shift, this could be a great natural solution to banish them.
If you want to give this trick a try and have already guzzled all the tea in your cupboard, you can buy a pack of 40 tea bags from Asda for just 45p, making this hack cost less than 1p each time.
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