Everyone loves seeing a bright green lawn to frame your home! Ensuring your yard gets plenty of water is essential to achieving happy and healthy grass. While it might sound simple, there is a method to how you should water your lawn to ensure it grows properly and as healthily as possible!
When to Water
Watering in the morning, before 10 a.m. is the perfect time to make sure your lawn gets the hydration it needs. This is the ideal time because the temperature is cooler, winds tend to be calmer, and the water has the best chance of soaking all the way into the soil to reach the roots before it can evaporate. If you aren’t able to water in the morning, try between 4 p.m. and 6 p.m., so the water still has time to dry before nightfall. Watering overnight is when your lawn is most likely to develop disease causing serious problems.
In general, grass is very resilient and can survive for weeks without being watered before turning brown! Rain can also help ensure that your lawn is well hydrated, so watering every day is not essential.
How Much Water to Use
For an established lawn, it’s recommended to use enough water so that the top 6 to 8 inches of the soil is wet. Ideally, your entire yard should receive 1 to 1.5 inches of water each week from watering or from rain to soak that deeply. Make sure not to overwater!
How to Tell if Your Lawn Needs to Be Watered
If you notice your grass has lost its vibrant green color and is more dull or even grayish or brown, it’s asking to be watered! Another tip for seeing if your lawn is begging for water is by simply walking across it. If your footprints don’t quickly disappear, then the blades of grass don’t have the moisture they need to spring back up, and it’s time for a good watering.
How to Tell if You’ve Watered Enough
Use some of these techniques to see if your lawn has gotten the water that it needs:
- Check the soil – Use a screwdriver and push it into the soil to test how deep the water has soaked in. Once you’ve determined the water has soaked in about 6 inches, then that’s how long it takes for your lawn to be watered thoroughly.
- Use cans to measure – Believe it or not, empty tuna cans can be very useful in helping you see how much water various spots on your lawn are getting. Spread them across the grass and see how long it takes the cans to fill up.
- Do some math – If you use a sprinkler, doing a simple calculation can give a very accurate estimate of how much time it takes to thoroughly water your yard. Start by multiplying the square footage of your lawn by 0.62 gallons (which equals 1 inch of water per square foot). Next, divide that number by the sprinkler flow rate (which should be available on the packaging or from the manufacturer). This calculation will tell you how many minutes to run your sprinkler! Invest in a water time so that your sprinkler can be preset to water the correct amount all on its own!
Home Exterior Care in Fairfield County
The experts and Landmark Exteriors are here to help your home both look and function it’s best. Give us a call at (203) 838-3838 to learn more about how we can help you.