How to Plant a Lawn

Ask a gardener how to plant a lawn and you’ll most likely get a solid answer.

Ask another gardener the same question and you’ll likely get another solid answer although the information might be quite different from the first gardener’s answer.

Ask another two, three . . . ten gardeners the same question and you’ll likely end up with that many different answers.

All answers you get will be correct, of course. That’s the beauty of gardening. It’s varied. It’s flexible. And there’s more than one way to do just about anything. Successfully.

Ask how to plant a lawn and you’re likely to get any number of answers.

There’s the fast way or the slow way. The expensive way or the frugal way. The method you choose when deciding how to plant a lawn will depend heavily upon your personality, time, and pocketbook.

The fastest and most expensive way (these two characteristics always seem to go hand in hand) is to hire a professional landscaping service and let the experts do the work.

Beyond that, there are several options to consider for how to plant a lawn in a more do-it-yourself fashion.

You might first want to see what kind of grass is growing successfully in your neighborhood. If it’s growing abundantly across the street or down the block, chances are it’s the best species of grass for your local soil and weather. You’ll probably be happiest with your lawn if you plant the same stuff.

If you are a patient kind of person, you might want to merely observe your yard for the first year you move into you home. Pay attention to where the water pools after a shower or where it drains too quickly. Where the sunshine is in the summer and where there’s shade. Where the sun and shade are in the winter months, too.

While you’re becoming familiar with your very own piece of paradise, you might want to consider nourishing your soil during the interim. Spread some compost to enrich the soil. Work it in well. You’ll probably dig up a good deal of the yard anyway when you get ready to plant so you might as well loosen the soil up now.

Whether you start slow or need to get the job started immediately, there are still a number of different approaches to take.

You can start inexpensively and without too much effort by placing plugs of grass intermittently around the yard. Water both the plugs and the area around them to encourage spreading. In time, your yard will be uniformly covered with lawn but it may take a few growing seasons.

A quicker and somewhat pricier approach is to plant squares of sod in a checkerboard pattern across the yard and water them the same way you would do the plug method. The bare spots between the squares will fill in quickly, maybe even in one growing season, depending upon you climate.

The most labor intensive and expensive way is to plant the entire yard at one time with a blanket of sod.

Regardless of which method you choose, one important step in how to plant a lawn is water. Make sure the ground to be planted is well watered before you begin the project.

After planting, water again to refresh the newly planted grass. Then water frequently the first few weeks so the root system of your new lawn gets a chance to establish itself firmly.

And get that lawn mower ready to go. You’ll be needing it soon.

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