Overseeding The Lawn

The guidelines for "overseeding the lawn say to cut the exiting grass down to 1".  I tried that.   The mower shimmied and shook!  It was actually a bit scary (seemed like the mower blade was coming loose or something).

I finally realized the blade area was just too filled with grass.  Apparrently, you can't cut grass that low in "mulching mode".   There was no where for all the cut grass to go!   So I raised it to 1.5".  Same thing.  2" was OK...

So now at least I have the grass cut low enough to cut it again (hopefully down to 1").  Why am I cutting it to 1" (you ask)?  Because newly-growing grass can actually be sucked up by a mower!  Weird but true!

But why am I doing this at all?  Grass spreads, right?  Not most.  The best grass for my part of the country is "turf-type tall fescue".  It clumps...   And insects and diseases kill some of them.  Which means new seeds every few years.  And I haven't done that for several years.

The good points about "turf-type tall fescue" are that it pretty tough grass and does well enough in full sun and partial shade (which pretty much defines my lawn), doesn't need much fertilizer, and is basically evergreen.

I mentioned "doesn't need much fertilizer".  Why not?  Well, what does a leafy plant need?  What it already has in itself, of course!  Grass has exactly what it wants most;  what it is already made up of.  Just leaving grass clippings on the lawn feeds the grass about 1/4 of what it needs to thrive.

It cracks me up to see neighbors carefully raking (or mower-bagging) thgeir grass-clippings.  And then putting them away in trash (or "yard-waste") bags.  And applying new (expensive and synthetic) fertilizer 3 times a year.  

And, BTW, they cut their grass too short.  Grass is sort of an equally "up and down" plant.  The taller the aboveground leaves, the deeper the roots.  So they are throwing away free "fertilizer", watering too often (and too shallowly all Summer), and buying "bad" fertilizer.

My lawn looks better and I hardly pay any attention to it.  The secret to some parts of the yard is knowing what you don't have to do...