Fall / Dormant Fertilizer

On Friday we put down the final fertilizer application for the season.

This is one application that people discuss what time of the year to apply it.  Earlier in Sept when the turf is still actively growing, right now when the turf is going into dormancy, or late fall after the plant has shut down and all growth has stopped?  I choose an organic for my product and go with a semi-dormant application where I hope for a small amount of release this time of year in the fall to make the plant healthy going into winter, and a slow release over the winter allowing for a quick spring green-up and growth.  An application this time of the year will provide a faster green-up in the spring compared to applying a product first thing in the spring.

The picture below is not great, but it was taken in early spring and  you can see above the red line the turf is greening up faster than surrounding turf because that area received a dormant fertilizer the fall before.

Spring picture showing turf greening up that received a dormant fertilizer application

Foam marker line

In the picture above you see a foam marker line. We have attached a kit to the vehicle pulling the fertilizer spreader that drops a foam dot every couple feet to allow us to see where our previous pass was.  This allows for a very precise application with minimal skips and overlaps.