17 June 2002
Cut the lawn today with an extra spacer. The spacer is about
3mm thick but seems to affect the amount of grass removed by
more than that. I should probably start measuring before and
after.
10 February 2003
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It snowed! On Thursday 30th January we had about 4
hours of heavy snowfall. All of London ground to a halt
as the
tube services stopped running and roads were reduced
to gridlock. However my grass looked lovely!
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22 March 2003
First cut of the year. It's looking a bit yellow in patches
and I'm wondering if I should do something about lawn feed.
Time for a bit of research.
2 January 2004
New year, time for a resolution. I'll see if I can actually
update this thing this year. Not much has happened in the last
year to the Garden apart from the addition of the robotic
lawn-mower. We have recently had a base put down for a shed
which will hopefully be coming before the end of this month.
The grass has suffered a little from being walked on while cold
and wet when the shed base went down but I'm leaving it alone
until the weather warms up a bit.
31 March 2004
First cut of the year! Installed a new blade on the Flymo and
set the cut a bit higher. After a trim and strim at the edges
it's looking a lot better than I thought but it's going to need
some work. Some patches have barely grown due to what I think
is poor soil and I've got some weeds that are going to need
digging out. The weeds aren't too bad so I don't want to use
any nasty weedkiller things but some lawn feed should help the
slow growing patches.
9 April 2004
Got RoboMower out today set on a highish cut. I would have liked
to get it out earlier but today was the first day it didn't rain
for about a week. The lawn itself really needs something doing
to it to flatten it, perhaps a roller?
24 April 2004
After a couple of weeks of rain the sun came out and the grass
has grown fast. So too have the weeds :-( Robo did his thing and
tidied up most of it but I'm going to need to do some weeding
or resort to nasty chemicals. Hopefully the good weather will
last and I'll be able to cut a bit more often.
2 May 2004
Cut the front lawn for the first time of the year. Actually,
front lawn is a bit of an over-exaggeration. It's a square about
10'x12'. Half belongs to next door who never cut it
(okay, they have done it once in 2 years). It's also really
prone to drying out as it appears to have very shallow soil.
The net result of all the neglect is it's more of a dandelion
patch than a lawn. I'm tempted to weed kill and fertilise just
my side, would make a good test of what it says on the packet.
Also trimmed the back.
5 May 2004
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I'm now the proud owner of some EverGreen Complete ready to use
granules. It claims to kill weeds as well as fertilising. I'll
try it on my half of the front lawn this evening. Needs some
rain (or watering with a hose) within 2 days of application
which seems like a certainty this week so no problems there.
Apparently it will take about 6 weeks to kill the weeds though!
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10 May 2004
Nice mix of rain and sun has made for perfect growing conditions.
I've got Robo out doing the back garden. The grass at the front
is also doing remarkably well so the EverGreen Complete must
make a big difference. The dandelions are looking twisted just
like it said they would on the packet. Needs a cut really but
that involves the Flymo and I'm getting over a nasty cold and
don't really want the extra work this evening.
Scotts, the makers of EverGreen Complete have a website complete with
QuickTime versions of their TV adverts [ low
(160x120) | high
(324x240) ]. I'm not sure if this is good or bad, it's
certainly a catchy advert but it can get a little irritating...
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12 May 2004
Front lawn cut. That's the shortest interval between cutting
for a long time. The half I put the fertiliser on is looking
much better. Still a bit patchy where the larger weeds were. I
think I'll have to do the back lawn.
15 May 2004
Back lawn cut with the big mower and edges strimmed. It would
benefit from the fertiliser and weed killer the front got, that
needs watering in so I might wait until some rain is forecast.
23 May 2004
Both lawns cut. Rain forecast for Friday so I'll probably
fertilise on Thursday evening. Next week is set to be warm and
wet which should work wonders.
28 May 2004
I've fertilised the back lawn, now I just need some decent rain
fall over the next few weeks. Not sure how even my application
was so I might end up with patchy grass. Oh well, time to wait
and see.
1 June 2004
Proper rain at last! It's drizzled for 5 minutes at a time over
the last few days but never soaked things properly. This morning
it's been raining steadily which should stop the front looking
like such a dessert as well as raining in the fertiliser/weed
killer properly. The weeds in the back are growing vigorously
(as claimed on the pack), they should start dieing soon...
4 June 2004
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Cut the back lawn and it's looking good but a bit stripy,
I don't think I managed to apply the Evergreen Complete
very evenly...
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11 June 2004
Another weak, another mow. Still looking stripy but the weeds
are now very much under my thumb. If the weather stays dry I
might try some water on fertiliser which might help get rid of
the strips, hopefully it will be easier to apply evenly.
5 July 2004
It's been over 3 weeks since I last did anything to the lawn
and it's not looking terribly well as a result. The middle part
of June was very dry and so there wasn't much growth. All changed
for the end of June once Wimbledon tennis started and we had a
good mix of rain and sun. The grass has grown well but I haven't
been able to get out with the lawnmover and some weeds are
beginning to show. Weather forecast for today is dry so hopefully
I can get out this evening for a cut'n'strim. From Wednesday
onwards it looks like we will be back into showers for a week
or so.
5 July 2004 - later...
Cut'n'strim successfully completed. It's looking much better
than I thought it would, I'm rather chuffed.
19 March 2005
Another year, another attempt at keeping this page updated.
Cleared up the last few leaves from the winter and had a
cut'n'strim today. It's going to need feeding soon as it's quite
thin in spots.
11 April 2005
Second cut of the year, should really
have done it about a week ago. Lots of weeds so I got out the
rest of my Evergreen Complete, only covered about a tenth of
the lawn before I ran out. Off to Tesco in the morning to buy
some more. The Evergreen Complete needs watering in within a
couple of days and we have rain due on Wednesday so hopefully
I'll be able to cover the rest of the lawn tomorrow.
13 April 2005
Purchased some more weedkiller/fertiliser yesterday but then
went to the pub so didn't get a chance to apply it. It's now
raining which means the bit I applied on the 11th should start
working but I can't put anymore down for a few days. Looks like
I'll have a greener patch on one side...
17 April 2005
Front lawn treated today as it's full of weeds, hopefully rain tomorrow.
19 April 2005
Rain! Yesterday only drizzled but lots of rain this
morning so the Evergreen at the front should get to work. Looks
dry for the rest of the week so I should be able to mow the
back and then treat the rest of that.
24 April 2005
If I were trying to grow dandelions I would win a competition
2005 and Spring 2006
2005 was a funny autumn as it stayed warm until very late in
the year but was quite damp, the leaves didn't really fall until
well into December. I didn't get out often enough so the lawn
managed to get really long over the winter. That encouraged it
to hold onto lots of leaves which I also didn't clear up. When
the spring came family commitments meant I couldn't get out to
mow so rather than I lawn I had a scrubby patch of long grass
and weeds :-(
17 April 2006
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Finally I managed to get out and mow the lawn! Flymo
was set to a medium cut and a massive amount of grass was
removed. Any resemblance to a green thing has gone and
I've got a yellow patch of scrubby and limp grass. Hopefully
it will perk up a bit.
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22 April 2006
Spent about an hour pulling out dandelions. The buggers seem
to have massive roots and in almost all cases I didn't do very
well at getting them out which means they will sprout again.
Perhaps if I pull them out often enough it will use up their
supply of food? Also mowed again and this time the lawn looks
a bit more alive, lots of the brown patches are showing fresh
growth and with any luck the whole thing will green up although
it could do with plenty of rain.
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