Give your lawn a boost naturally now, and it will pay off all year long!
1. Aerate to relieve compaction.
Do this in the fall when there are fewer active weed seeds to spread. Then the roots can spread out and the beneficial bacteria can grow.

2. Overseed to outcompete weeds. Choose the right seed for your area.

3. Test the soil for nitrogen, phosphorus and pH with a soil testing kit or with the help of a university cooperative extension. Use compost to replete nutrients only if necessary and lyme to adjust the pH if needed.

4. Leave the grass clippings to replace nutrients and help retain moisture.
Let the grass grow to four inches and clip it down to three so the roots can grow long and strong.

5. Add clover, alfalfa, or cowpea to your lawn. They have bacteria and fungi on their roots that can take nitrogen from the air and change it into a form plants can use. They are a natural, ongoing, and healthy way to feed your lawn and garden.

Caring for our lawns and gardens is all about nurturing our soil culture. Well, almost all about soil culture. It is also about changing our mindset so that we are happy with a few weeds because we know it is healthier for our families.

Labor Day weekend is here, and usually that means many homeowners spend time working on their yards and gardens. This year in Bedford, NY, it is still too dry to work on renovating our turf or planting shrubs.
But with the El Nino in the Pacific we are likely to have a wet, mild, winter here in the Northeast. The Southwestern states will likely be a little cooler than usual, and all of the Southern states are expected to get more rain.
So start thinking about adding some native plants to your garden.
Native plants will not need artificial pesticides or fertilizers, so they protect our drinking water from contamination. They will also provide the right type of food for bees, butterflies, and birds. And for many of the birds and butterflies, that food has to power their migration (that is starting now!) down to South America.
In California and other states where drought is a very long-term problem, think of native plants that will tolerate the drought, but realize that you have to keep them well watered for the first year so they can become established.
For the rest of us, start planning what native plants go best where in your backyard. Do they like sun, partial sun, dry, or moist conditions. And get ready to plant when the rains come, because fall is when root growth is the strongest.

While Monarch caterpillars only eat Milkweed, they sometimes hide on other plants near the milkweed.
One of the delights of a pesticide free garden!

The United States Geological Survey found three neonicotinoid pesticides were present in all of nine streams it tested in an area where corn and soy are grown in the midwest.
79 samples were taken from the nine streams. Tests were done to detect three neonicotinoid pesticides. The frequency of detection and concentration (maximum:median) were:
clothianidin (75%, 257 ng/L:8.2 ng/L)
thiamethoxam (47%, 185 ng/L:<2 ng/L) imidacloprid (23%, 42.7 ng/L: <2 ng/L). Amounts were higher after planting because seeds are coated, and after rainfalls because the pesticide travels with rainwater. Neonicotinoids are harmful to bees. They have also been linked to abnormal neurologic development in people in several studies. and our drinking water comes from these streams.

Remember to buy plants that have not been treated with neonicotinoids. They stay in the plant indefinitely, are harmful to pollinators, and can wind up in our drinking water.
Lowe’s and many other big box stores are phasing out plants with neonicotinoids, but meantime many of these stores are at least labeling plants that have been treated so homeowners can avoid killing bees and butterflies when they plant pollinator gardens.

NASA researchers set out to measure the amount of turf grass grown in the US. The stumbling block was that much of the turf grass is on small plots and hard to distinguish from NASA land assessment satellites. So they found a correlation between impervious surface and lawn that stayed surprisingly constant across the US. With this tool they were able to calculate that there is three times as much turf grass than corn in the US!
This ranks it as the largest irrigated crop in the country covering over 128,000 square kilometers, or almost 50,000 square miles.
The study also showed that as much as 16.7 teragrams of carbon each year could be kept out of the atmosphere and stored in lawns by simply leaving clippings on the grass and letting them decompose. That’s equivalent to about 37 billion pounds—the weight of about 147,000 blue whales. Additionally, the lawns will require at least half as much fertilizer, saving even more carbon.
Our homes will be so much prettier if we replace much of these lawns with native plants. They won’t need chemicals, many can absorb and filter so much more water than grass can, and they provide food and housing for the insects, amphibians, and birds we all need. This is such an easy and beautiful way to improve our water quality!

The diabetes drug metformin is frequently found in freshwater streams because it is not fully removed during water treatment. It is often found at concentrations much higher than estrogens. Until now, it has been assumed that the estrogens are what is causing so many male freshwater fish to take on female characteristics, often including having eggs. But research just published in Chemosphere found that male fish who were exposed to small amounts of the diabetes drug metformin became feminized. This means that metformin is interfering with their sex hormones.
When we drink water that contains even tiny amounts of these drugs or ingest fish that contain them, it inevitably interferes with the normal hormonal regulation of our bodies, too. Interfering with sex hormones in people can cause increases in breast and prostate cancer and infertility.
This is a good reason not to flush drugs down the drain, but to take them to drug take-backs. Many police stations will take back unused pharmaceuticals. If not, bring them to your local household waste disposal site.

A study by Lu and others from the Harvard School of Public Health that was published yesterday found that 70 percent of pollen and honey from bees across Massachusetts had at least one neonicotinoid pesticide. Some had more.
We know this is bad for bees, and bees need all the help they can get right now. But it is bad for all of us who eat honey, too!
We can all make a difference by only buying plants that have not been treated with neonicotinoids.
The neonics stay in the plant for its lifetime, even if just the seed was treated. This was initially thought to be a boon to the environment, because it would avoid widespread spraying. Turns out it poses a serious threat to our pollinators, and lingers in our food!
Easy to help by asking if a plant is neonicotinoid free before you buy it. This will give bees a healthy haven in our yards.

An article in the Guardian reveals that Prozac that slips through wastewater treatment can harm starlings.
Prozac is common in small amounts in wastewater. A new study shows that starlings exposed to similar levels of Prozac have altered foraging behavior, putting them at jeopardy.
Other studies they mention showed that starlings exposed to very small amounts of endocrine disrupting chemicals like birth control pills (that also show up in wastewater) grow more slowly and have altered immune responses.
These chemicals aren’t good for birds, and they are not good for our families.
One easy way to decrease the exposure to both birds and us is to dispose of drugs responsibly. The DEA drug take back initiative means that many police stations will accept your unwanted drugs. If not, bring them to your local household waste disposal site.

I have been using Horticultural Vinegar as my go to weed killer for a very long time, but now there are some interesting, natural alternatives on the market. I decided to try three of these head to head on weeds on my patio to see which worked best in this spot. Stilt grass and purslane are my worst offenders.
Much to my surprise A.D.I.O.S. (salt) and Burnout (citrus oil and clove oil) were not effective. The horticultural vinegar quickly did the trick.
Table vinegar is usually about 5% acetic acid. It is not reliable at controlling weeds. Horticultural vinegar is 20% acetic acid, and incredibly effective at killing annual weeds. It does a good job on many perennial weeds, but may need repeated applications because it doesn’t always kill the roots.
Even for these annuals there was some regrowth and I will need to repeat the process.
So the winner is…Horticulutural Vinegar!

(but move cushions out of the way first so they don’t get bleached)

Yesterday France banned the sale of Roundup from garden centers in the wake of the World Health Organization finding that it is linked to cancer, including non Hodgkins lymphoma. They also announced plans for more sweeping controls of residential pesticides in 2018.
There is no need to wait for legislation prohibiting routine use of these chemicals in our yards and gardens. Even if someone else is using them, we are all exposed in our water. There are good alternatives now!
Five natural alternatives:
1.horticultural vinegar 2.citrus oil 3.a weed torch 4. add clove oil to vinegar or citrus oil to increase killing power 5. hand weeding where sensible