I'd totally be ok if you lay out a lawn care plan and schedule for CSi Ontario and we can follow your guidelines.

I've raked and detached my lawn and my next question is - when do I fertilize and seed? I've got some bare spots from the raccoons digging up the grubs.

There's never a time you can't fertilize. It can always be done. The problem is people over-fertilize & then either burn their lawn or don't want to deal with cutting it after. I fertilized weekly last year inorder to speed up the process of my lawn looking like shit after some major work.


It's better to spoon-feed the lawn Once a month compared to loading it up every 3 months.

Right now we're still in clean up, rake, cut etc. As soon as we have 5 days of 15c straight, you can then begin the over-seeding.

The very most important part of overseeding is soil to seed contact, which means raking it in, top dressing or best using a lawn roller if you have. Don't just sprinkle it on and hope for the best. That won't work.

Before overseeding, you need to cut the lawn, one level SHORTER than you normally cut the grass at. Give the new seed a chance, don't have it competing for sunlight against the existing grass.

3rd there are only 2 seed types I would recommend in Ontario's climate. Kentucky Blue Grass or Perrenial Rye Grass. Which you pick, depends on your goal. Tall Type Fescue needs to be cut too tall 4" and looks like shit imo. I'm trying to rid my backyard of it.


Kentucky Blue Grass grows sideways (creeps) as well as up. So it can fill bare spots over time. So your lawn gets thicker as time goes on. It doesn't die in heat or winter, but instead goes dormant. But it take 27 days to germinate from seed.

Most people don't have the patience to wait a month for it to grow. Trying to water it 3 times a day. (Morning, Noon & Night) in order to keep the seed wet. While their yard looks like a dirt pile.


Perrienal Rye Grass germinates from seed in 7 days, but only grows where you drop it. It will not creep, so if you miss a spot it'll stay that way till you seed again. It will die in extreme heat if it doesn't get watered. If watered it'll just go dormant. Some will die off in the cold. It's also the darkest green grass type that you can get.

Now I can't tell you which one to pick & if you don't want to. Use both, just know that the colour up close won't be an exact match. From standing height most don't know the difference.


Now based on history the last week of April to May 24 weekend is usually when we hit the magic 15c for 5 days in a row. Each year is different.

So until then, keep cutting only 1/3 of the grass blade at a time of, keep raking, set your mower height properly, 2-3" height of cut for most & level out the dips in the lawn with topsoil.

I'll add the proper way to fertilize the lawn later on in the week.

There's never a time you can't fertilize. It can always be done. The problem is people over-fertilize & then either burn their lawn or don't want to deal with cutting it after. I fertilized weekly last year inorder to speed up the process of my lawn looking like shit after some major work.


It's better to spoon-feed the lawn Once a month compared to loading it up every 3 months.

Right now we're still in clean up, rake, cut etc. As soon as we have 5 days of 15c straight, you can then begin the over-seeding.

The very most important part of overseeding is soil to seed contact, which means raking it in, top dressing or best using a lawn roller if you have. Don't just sprinkle it on and hope for the best. That won't work.

Before overseeding, you need to cut the lawn, one level SHORTER than you normally cut the grass at. Give the new seed a chance, don't have it competing for sunlight against the existing grass.

3rd there are only 2 seed types I would recommend in Ontario's climate. Kentucky Blue Grass or Perrenial Rye Grass. Which you pick, depends on your goal. Tall Type Fescue needs to be cut too tall 4" and looks like shit imo. I'm trying to rid my backyard of it.


Kentucky Blue Grass grows sideways (creeps) as well as up. So it can fill bare spots over time. So your lawn gets thicker as time goes on. It doesn't die in heat or winter, but instead goes dormant. But it take 27 days to germinate from seed.

Most people don't have the patience to wait a month for it to grow. Trying to water it 3 times a day. (Morning, Noon & Night) in order to keep the seed wet. While their yard looks like a dirt pile.


Perrienal Rye Grass germinates from seed in 7 days, but only grows where you drop it. It will not creep, so if you miss a spot it'll stay that way till you seed again. It will die in extreme heat if it doesn't get watered. If watered it'll just go dormant. Some will die off in the cold. It's also the darkest green grass type that you can get.

Now I can't tell you which one to pick & if you don't want to. Use both, just know that the colour up close won't be an exact match. From standing height most don't know the difference.


Now based on history the last week of April to May 24 weekend is usually when we hit the magic 15c for 5 days in a row. Each year is different.

So until then, keep cutting only 1/3 of the grass blade at a time of, keep raking, set your mower height properly, 2-3" height of cut for most & level out the dips in the lawn with topsoil.

I'll add the proper way to fertilize the lawn later on in the week.

What options do you have if you have kids that are always on the grass? SOL? I can have them stay off for a few days and maybe stretch it to a week.

backyard? buy turf and be done.

Great info. I think this is the year to finally turn the lawn around considering I am around to water. Now that I know the type of seed to buy, where do I buy it in Toronto?

Alright boss man, give us the goods despite the snow.

I am condensing your posts for my own notes:

Overseed - 5 days of 15c - (end of April - 1st 2 weeks of May)
Prep: cut lawn shorter than average (rake in & topsoil) - roller nice to have*

1. How often to water once you overseed? What time of day do you water?
2. When do we apply fertilizer relative to pre and post overseeding?

What options do you have if you have kids that are always on the grass? SOL? I can have them stay off for a few days and maybe stretch it to a week.

Ok, the proper way to fertilize is to do it by the amount of Nitrogen in the bag. NOT by the season.

Never exceed more than 1lb of nitrogen over 1000 sq ft. I personally put down only 0.5lb of Nitrogen at a time.

So use Google Earth or an old-school measuring tape and see how big your yard is. Front, side, back etc. Break it up into sections.

Then use this website to figure out your amounts. http://agebb.missouri.edu/fertcalc/ Plugin the fertilizer that you currently using.


My front yard is roughly 1000sq ft, the fertilizer I use is 16-16-16. Once you punch the information into the website you find out the amount in LBS that you're supposed to put down. I chose to do it at 0.5lbs. That leaves me with 3lbs of product that I'm allowed to put down. Once you see how little you're supposed to actually use, you'll quickly see why people fuck it up.


That 3lbs has to be spread out over the entire 1000sq ft evenly. So then set your spreader to the lowest setting that the product will actually fit through the hopper and do multiple passes to ensure even coverage of the product. Don't try and do it in one pass.

Now whether you put that down, weekly, monthly etc all depends on how often you want to be cutting your lawn.

I put it down weekly last year as I needed it to fill in bare spots quickly as I was running out of my ideal temperature window to grow grass and was cutting it 5-6 times a week. This year I don't have to do that as my grass is much better this year. So I can fertilize less, which means I'll be cutting less 2-3 times a week.

As a reminder, it is always better to seed in the fall, but I understand if one doesn't want to look at a bare lawn until then.

The dandelions came out with a vengeance

got a puppy a month ago, RIP my lawn.

Am I still SOL for up-keeping the lawn?