Seeding with Biology

Our friend Dan and his wife Kristyn recently bought a home in Manhattan. The lawn was in rough shape…hardly a lawn at all.

Dan and Kristyn have three dogs.  When it rained this “lawn” turned into a muddy mess, which soon was transported into the house by 12 lil muddy paws.  Dan wanted a thick, healthy lawn with NO mud, but also didn’t want to spend a small fortune on sod.

The key to getting healthy perennial seed germination instead of annual weeds is balanced soil biology.  Annual weeds like a bacterial dominated soil while desirable perennial grasses, like our favorite lawn grasses, prefer more fungi.  We helped Dan with a program of balanced biologicals and biological/fungi friendly fertility to set him up for vigorous germination of desirable perennial grasses.  Increased germination isn’t the only benefit from our biological based program.  It also builds soil structure, improves natural nutrient cycling, decreases weed pressure, stores more soil carbon, and expands your soil sponge allowing you to have a thick, lush lawn with less water than the chemical lawn folks. 

Here are some pictures that show Dan’s progress from late April until early June:

This thick, healthy lawn established from a biological head start uses less water and has fewer weeds than a weaker, chemical lawn would.  We recommend NEVER applying chemical fertilizers as they will throw the biology off balance, kill soil life, damage your soil sponge, encourage more weed growth, and leak out into the environment, causing more problems downstream.

Note, Dan also practiced good management all season.  This might sound silly, but good management will help grow a lush lawn and bad management will kill your grass and put you back in the mud pit.