Question
I want to start a seasonal care plan for my lawn. I know u can't tell me how to do this in a few sentences. But it is now early Feburary  in Weast Virginia and perhaps u can start me off there. I have a bermuda lawn with lots of weeds. Where do I start. Thanks

P.S. Maybe a book.?  

Answer
Don't worry .. it will work. You will have a great lawn.
Kenneth

=====
Good lawn care involves weed control, fertilizing, mowing and watering.

Bermuda is a warm season lawn which means it grow actively in hot weather but is brown and dormant in cool weather and winter.

If you have a whole lot of weeds, grassy and broadleaf, and you are sure the bermuda is completely dormant (e.g. brown and that includes the long runners which is how bermuda spreads and fill in) you can spray ROUND-UP which is a non-selective contact herbicide. This means that it does not care if it is grass of other plants, including weeds, grass, flowers of bushes, it will kill plants on contact with green leafy material. If your bermuda is dormant you can spray the lawn and kill any cool season weeds which would be green. The herbicide is not active in the soil, so you dont have to worry about residuals etc. It only kills plants on direct contact.

Bermuda is slow to green up in spring, but once soil tempeatures warm it turns green. Start to fertilize the lawn after it has green naturally and you have had to mow. do not fertilize too early in spring. Some of your neighbors who grow cool season grass (bluegrass, ryegrass, tall fescue) will fertilize in spring. DONT. Bermuda should not be fertilized too early in spring. Once the bermuda grows and you need to mow it, fertilize it every 30-45 days. If you can find a lawn fertilizer for "southern lawns" then this is preferred. Otherwise consider organic alternatives (Ringer, Espoma, Milorganite). A good garden center can help you. Normally you must not fertilize a cool sesaon lawn in summer, but bermuda (being a warm season lawn) should be fertilized regularily through the late spring, summer and fall.

If you did not manage to eradicate weeds while the bermuda was dormant, use a broadleaf weed control product. These are also sold as WEED-AND-FEED products (fertilizer w/weed control) or you can buy a bottle of Weed-be-Gon and spray the lawn in late spring (dont spray when temperatures are consistently above 85F or you kill the lawn).. Weed-be-gon will handle broadleaf weeds (dandelions, clover, plantains, etc). They even make a weed-be-gon which comes in a bottle which has a nossle and which attaches to your gardenhose. Then just go along and spray your entire lawn with the nossle (watering/spraying at the same time).

In summer, all you have to do is to fertilize every 30-45 days and mow the lawn regularily. Bermuda is best mowed at 2.5" tall unless you have a new hybrid version in which case a lower mowing can be used.

Generally, bermuda does well with one deep watering per week through rain or manual watering. A deep watering means watering for 2 hours or longer per application. Avoid shallow 15 minutes applications. If it has rained you do not need to water, but if it has not rained for 7-10 days, you should consider setting up a sprinkler (a plastic sprinkler attached to a garden hose is fine). Run it for 2 hours and move it so that the entire lawn area gets watered about 1.5-2 hours each. During the very hot dog days of summer, twice per week may be needed especially if there a draught spell.

In fall (about October) apply one last fertilizer application. Keep mowing the lawn until it stops growing. Gradually stop watering in late fall to preparre the lawn for dormancy (dont worry about rain. I am talking about manual watering).

That is really it:
- weeds can be handled in extreme cases with ROUND-UP but do make sure that the bermuda is fully dormant and that you apply on a calm day (to avoid drift to shrubs, trees and flowers). Otherwise a broadleaf weed control product in early summer is fine.
- fertilizer reguarily (30-45 days) after the bermuda has greened up on it's own. Stop in October.
- water reguarily through the hottest period of the year. A deep infrequent application is better than many frequent shallow applications. It is ok to divide the lawn into sections and water them on different days if this is easier.
- MOW, MOW,MOW,MOW.. this is the best you can do for your lawn. Keep the height 2.5" tall (after a mowing) and mow frequently. A lawn responds better to many frequent mowings rather than you cutting a lot of material off every so often. e.g. it is better to cut the lawn when it is 3.5-4" and mow it back to 2.5" rather than waiting until it is 6" and chopping off too much leaf material. Mow frequently to produce the nicest, lushest, lawn.



One last (not too well known) tip:
- your last application of fertilizer of the year (October) will do wonders for your lawn. Most people skip this because they figure they should be finished with the lawn at this time. Some people may even recommend that you skip it for other reasons, but it is the one single application which will build reserves in the roots for next year, so don't skip.

Kenneth