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This lawns chapter from the Extension Gardener Handbook reviews installation and care of turfgrass as well as management strategies for turfgrass problems. This chapter also reviews options for turfgrass alternatives.
This factsheet provides instructions on how to properly care for tall fescue grass year round. It includes recommendations for mowing, fertilization, watering, pest control, and renovation.
This comprehensive guide offers information on different grasses for North Carolina lawns, as well as how to establish, care for, maintain, and renovate a new lawn.
The following management practices will help you care for your lawn throughout the year. Location, terrain, soil type and condition, age of the lawn, previous lawn care, and other factors affect turf performance, so adjust these management practices and dates to suit your particular lawn.
This guide to lawn maintenance for North Carolina contains information on establishing a new lawn, maintaining it, and controlling lawn pests using organic methods. It also provides information on renovating an existing lawn.
This factsheet offers information on the top performing tall fescue and Kentucky bluegrass turf cultivars in North Carolina.
This calendar provides detailed information for the proper care of centipedegrass.
This publication for homeowners and landscapers describes how to mow, fertilize, irrigate, and control weeds in a zoysiagrass lawn.
Turfgrass, trees, and shrubs are desired in most landscapes because they are attractive and useful. Unfortunately, growing turfgrasses in the presence of trees and shrubs can be a formidable task because each plant group competes with the other for the light, water, and nutrients that are essential for survival and growth. Even so, homeowners can take steps to improve the performance of a lawn growing in shade.
This annual guide supplies information concerning pesticides that can be used for controlling pests in turfgrasses. Revised for 2023.
This publication offers strategies for maintaining green turf during the winter using turf colorants. It discusses considerations for using colorants, different product types for specific uses, application rates and methods, and cost to help you plan winter turf maintenance.
This calendar offers suggestions regarding management practices for all-season care of a bermudagrass athletic field.
This factsheet offers information on the top-performing tall fescue and Kentucky bluegrass, and fine fescue turf cultivars in North Carolina.
This calendar contains suggestions designed to help in the care and maintenance of St. Augustinegrass throughout the year. It includes recommendations for mowing, fertilization, watering, pest control, and renovation.
Recommended maintenance practices for a lawn that consists of a blend of tall fescue, hard (fine) fescue, and Kentucky bluegrass are the same as those for a tall fescue lawn. The following management practices will help you care for your lawn throughout the year.
This publication offers fertilizer suggestions for a variety of crops, including field, pasture and hay crops, tree fruit, small fruit, ornamental plants and vegetable crops.
A guide to maintaining quality turf on athletic fields, including recommendations for establishing and caring for new fields, maintaining established fields, and managing pests.
This publication answers common questions dog owners may have about lawn care. Topics include what kinds of grasses to use in high traffic areas; how to deal with damage to lawns caused by dogs; dogs' exposure to pesticides; and why dogs occasionally eat turfgrass.
Water is an essential component for plant growth. In turfgrasses it comprises 75 to 90 percent of the fresh weight of the plant, and irrigation is a key cultural practice in turfgrass management. Only 1 percent of the water absorbed is utilized for metabolic activity. By considering the factors that contribute to water loss, turfgrass managers can devise effective irrigation plans for specific sites.
This factsheet provides instructions on how to properly care for carpetgrass year round. It also includes information on fertilization and integrated pest management.
This publication discusses how to ensure efficient supplemental water management to maintain turfgrass growth by evaluating irrigation system performance. Completing an audit of an irrigation system provides the information needed to set irrigation controllers to deliver the proper amount of water.
This publication offers information on water quality challenges in irrigation water.
Recommended maintenance practices for a lawn that consists of a blend of tall fescue and Kentucky bluegrass are the same as those for a tall fescue lawn. The following management practices will help you care for your lawn throughout the year.
This publication reports the results of an annual survey of sod growers in North Carolina to determine and track relative inventory levels and project price changes for the year.
This factsheet provides information on how to keep a lawn healthy and attractive and how to protect the environment by reducing runoff and trapping pollutants. Fertilizer facts and rates, a mowing guide, and watering recommendations are included.
Although groundwater and surface waters are rarely polluted by turfgrass pesticides, turf managers should consider the potential for environmental contamination when choosing a pesticide.
This factsheet summarizes the characteristics of centipedegrass.
Lawns are ecosystems that impact surface and groundwater systems. The grasses found in lawns clean the environment by absorbing gaseous pollutants and intercepting pesticides, fertilizers, dust, and sediment. Irrigation water properly applied to lawns remains on site to recharge water supplies. In addition, grasses release oxygen and reduce glare, noise, and summer temperatures. Proper management practices need to be developed and followed to protect this environment. The purpose of this publication is to provide you with management strategies to preserve and protect water resources.
Proper application of pesticides and fertilizers, which protects water quality, is possible only with a sprayer or spreader that is accurately calibrated. Pesticides applied with equipment that has not been calibrated may be misapplied by more than 10 percent. That may lead to repeat applications, damaged plants, excess cost, and contamination of the environment.
Infestations of moss in turf are associated with unfavorable conditions for growing healthy, dense turf. This publication offers control options.
This guide is designed to help turf managers identify the major turfgrass pests found in North Carolina and better understand their life cycles, symptoms, and biology.
This publication describes the best management practices (BMP) to reduce sediment and keep nutrients and pesticides applied to turf from contaminating North Carolina's water resources.
Knowing a few basics and having some appropriate tools is all that is necessary before you can build your own baseball field. These illustrated instructions can be used to set up a baseball field on a relatively level, open area of ground.
This poster-sized landscape management calendar is a guide to keeping your landscape healthy with sound management practices. It discusses proper establishment and maintenance practices as well as monitoring and targeted treatment of pests.
Durable athletic fields begin with sound construction and careful planning. Good management practices can increase a field's durability. The basic concepts presented in this guide can help field managers extend the usability of athletic fields.
