Lawn Ideas, Tips & Guides

Are you passionate about gardening and looking to elevate your green space? Discover how a GardenAdvice.co.uk course can help you transform your garden into a vibrant, low-maintenance haven. In this GardenAdvice is helping an aspiring gardener with a garden in Hemel Hempstead after the gardeners owner attended a GardenAdvice gardening course in the garden.

Collaborative post

Gardeners just getting into garlic have some decisions to make: there are dozens of different varieties, and choosing which one to grow can be difficult. But it’s hard to go wrong. Experimenting with various varieties can lead to a new appreciation of a crop you already love.

Moss is a primitive green plant with threadlike stems and tiny leaves and can form a spongy, dense mat over the soil surface. While it’s pretty in certain settings, such as a shady forest trail, you may not like the looks of it in your lawn. But is it hurting your grass? And will it eventually take over your whole yard?

I’m often asked for advice on visiting gardens in the UK.

Whether you are renovating a weedy lawn or overseeding existing turf, timing is critical to establishing a healthy, robust lawn. Proper timing ensures good seed germination and allows grass seedlings time to establish a healthy root system before the environmental stresses of summer or winter arrive. In turn, a healthy grass stand is better able to compete against weeds and requires less maintenance. We visited with a lawn expert to learn more about the ideal time to reseed lawns, factors to consider, and techniques for achieving a lush and healthy lawn.

Going on holiday? A few simple tasks before you go will keep it all ticking over so you can enjoy your time away. Watch this clip from Gardeners’ World for lots of quick and easy techniques that will help to keep your patio pots from drying out while you’re away on holiday. Monty Don offers handy tips, including a novel idea for keeping a moisture-loving eucomis happy.

Creeping cinquefoil (Potentilla reptans) is a native wildflower with pretty, bright yellow blooms and fresh green foliage. It’s commonly found growing as a ‘lawn weed’, where it brightens up flowering lawns in summer. It’s an excellent plant for wildlife, with flowers that attract pollinating insects and foliage used as a foodplant by the grizzled skipper butterfly. Creeping cinquefoil is tough, drought tolerant and deep rooting, and can be used to provide colour and ground cover in low-maintenance areas like banks and wild gardens, as well as to help stabilise soil on slopes. However, in borders, its spreading growth is less desirable.

When the rewilded garden by Urquhart & Hunt won ‘Best in Show’ at RHS Chelsea in 2002, it triggered a debate about whether rewilding could be called gardening at all.

These are the top trends at RHS Hampton Court 2024. They are the ideas that I think translate best to real gardens.

Q: We’ve just moved into our home, a new build in the countryside, and don’t have much of a budget to create a garden. We’d like to start by sowing a traditional lawn around the house, which is just a big expanse of bare soil and weeds. Any tips would be great. CB, Co Meath

What are worm casts?

The term ‘low-maintenance gardening’ has been kicking about since the 1970s. But people’s perception of what that means varies wildly. To some it’s concrete slabs and gravel with not a green leaf in sight. To others it’s lawn and shrubs or geotextile cloaked with gravel and topped with pots. In essence it’s about having an outdoor space that requires minimal input while looking consistently smart. But the question really is: is there such a thing as a low-maintenance garden that is also attractive?

Happy Friday GPODers!

Wireworms are the soil-dwelling larvae of the click beetle, and live predominantly in undisturbed grassland. In gardens they can sometimes cause problems by eating the roots of seedlings and older plants, as well as burrowing into root vegetables. There’s around 60 species of click beetle in the UK and only a handful of their larvae cause problems, yet all of them are a source of food source for creatures such as birds and small mammals. In general, wireworms may only be a problem in ground that has been converted from lawn or grassland into a vegetable plot, particularly when root vegetables such as potatoes are grown.

To kids, dandelions provide endless hours of seed-blowing entertainment. To adults, they represent endless hours of weeding. To get ahead of these stubborn weeds, take a cue from the kid inside of you and focus on the seeds. Dandelions have a deep tap root and can live for many years, making them challenging to control once established. The most effective management strategies focus on prevention and removal of young plants. Here’s how to get rid of dandelions and get back to enjoying the landscape.

Geese are beautiful in their natural setting. But they’re not so great when congregating on your lawn, damaging your turf, honking loudly, and leaving behind droppings. “Geese can be destructive,” says Robert Pierce, PhD, state extension fisheries and wildlife specialist at theUniversity of Missouri. “Once they have a nest, it’s difficult to get them to leave. It’s easier to move them off your property in the winter before they start breeding.”

Every gardener knows that when the weather warms, it's weed-killing season. Weeds can harm your garden and lawn and steal nutrients your precious plants need. On top of that, they take away from the outdoor aesthetic you've worked hard to create.

Marty Baldwin

More and more homeowners are seeking to replace their traditional lawns with ones that are easier to maintain or more environmentally responsible. It sounds straightforward enough, but choosing the right plants for a lawn can be challenging. One must consider sun exposure, expected foot traffic, moisture requirements, and situational obstacles such as clay soil and juglone fromblack walnut trees (Juglans nigra, Zones 4–9). This list aims to help Southeast gardeners choose the lawn replacement with the best chance of success for their yards.

The weather in the U.S. intensifies every year. Right now, a heat wave has sent temperatures soaring across the country while Florida is experiencing a rare flash flood emergency. And it is likely to continue being extreme: according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, there is an 85 percent chance that this hurricane season will have more storms than average and, with that, more rainfall.

Aesthetics and style trend have taken over our interiors, and we love that trends are spreading into our outdoor spaces, too. This year, as organic decor and biophilic design continue to dominate our home decor feeds, a similar gardening trend is growing—literally.

There’s nothing like the clean lines of freshly cut grass. But, what if we told you skipping your final step of bagging those grass clippings can actually help you grow lusher, thicker grass—and at no additional cost to you? Allowing your mower to leave behind grass clippings can have a variety of benefits for your lawn.

The gardens at Charleston

Temperatures are expected to be higher than ever this summer, with record-breaking heatwaves already hitting the Southwest United States. You might be prepared with ways to beat the heat, but what about your garden? 

With hot temperatures rising across the country this year, this summer is the perfect breeding ground for mosquitoes. These insects look for hot and humid conditions—and they’re likely to find these conditions in more places than usual this year.

Curious about what outdoor trends are best suited for helping you relish the joys of summer—and which ones are best for taking off on a permanent vacation? We surveyed design pros and asked them what items they’re booting from their own yards this summer and which ones they think are prime for their moment in the sun.

Chafer grubs are the larvae of chafer beetles in the family Scarabaeidae, which also includes dung beetles. There are eight species of chafer beetle in the UK. Some can cause issues in lawns, but many do not. In fact, some chafer beetles are pollinators, while some larvae help break down decaying matter. What’s more, chafer beetles and their larvae form part of healthy ecosystems, providing food for a range of birds and mammals.

Using leaf mulch in the garden is one of the best ways to build soil, reduce weeds, retain moisture, and insulate plants. Plus, you can turn mulched leaves into leaf mold which saves money on buying compost and other soil amendments. In this article I’ll show you three easy ways to make leaf mulch and how to put it to work in your garden. What is leaf mulch? Leaf mulch is a layer of leaves applied to the soil surface around plants. It’s made from fallen leaves, whic

Drive through the neighborhood or the local park, and chances are you'll see the sprinklers in full force at various times of day, especially when temperatures increase. Lawn is known for being a water guzzler because it needs plenty of H20 to stay healthy. Yet leaving the sprinklers on for a long time doesn't mean it's better for the grass. Watering for too long, at the wrong time of day, or incorrectly costs money and wastes a precious resource. The way you water, how long, and when are all important factors that can ensure you're watering effectively and sufficiently to keep your turf green and your wallet happy.

<use xlink:href="#trending-icon" href="#trending-icon" xmlns:xlink=«http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink»> Trending Videos

Ants are known to provide refuge to insects such as aphids and whiteflies and can do much damage to the garden. Plus, ant colonies are massive and can keep you from using a portion of the lawn! So how do we fix that? By planting plants that are anti-ant and keep them away.

Summer is nearly here, and with it, comes plenty of time spent out on the green. From picnics to parties to barbeques and everything in between, having a lawn is a pretty lovely way to incorporate some summer fun into your life—but keeping your lawn green and happy isn’t always quite as fun, and green turf isn’t quite as soft and enjoyable, either. That’s what has us so intrigued by the new trend of “lazy lawns.”

<use xlink:href="#trending-icon" xmlns:xlink=«http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink»> Trending Videos

 Do you feel like your cat is missing out on all the outdoor fun? Well, fret no more! With some DIY patios, you can build them their own little piece of paradise.

If you are interested in pollinator-friendly garden practices and sustainable landscaping, you’ve probably heard of “No Mow May” before. The campaign encourages homeowners to retire their lawnmowers in May to help native pollinators as they emerge from hibernation.