How to improve my patchy, weed infested lawns - beginner gardener

[Seasidecatlady]

I bought a house a couple of years ago and this is my first experience of having a garden.

So far I have worked on the hedges, borders, planted fruit trees and dug up a small pond.

However, my front and back garden lawns still look patchy when cut, seem to be made of more weeds than grass and generally look rather sad. Many of my neighbours are garden obsessives and have incredibly neat, green and manicured lawns so mine stand out for all the wrong reasons.

I am finally tackling the job of removing the out of control weeds at the moment (I don't want to use any chemicals) as much as I can then I am planning to add more grass seeds.

Do you have any tips about what tools could make removing the weeds easier and advice on how to improve and maintain the state of my lawns long term?

My lawn is full of ‘weeds’ too but I don’t mind. Buttercups are pretty in the areas we leave to grow long, and clover is gorgeous when in flower. I’m not keen on dandelions though. Certainly don’t like all weeds. An an even greenness is what you want in a lawn but that doesn’t need to be pure grass.

Can you post a photo? Do you know what the weeds are?

Increase the mower height slightly.

Fill a watering can. Add a dash of washing up liquid. And I mean a teeny dash! Stir and sprinkle over.

What sort of weeds?

If you google 'fiskars weed puller' I use one of those to get all my perennials out, so dandelions, thistles, creeping buttercup and anything else it can 'grab'. I usually do it on rainy days, walk round, removing and jettisoning the weeds into trugs to put on the 'bad weed' compost heap.

I leave the daisies as one of my cats likes to run around and bite their heads off.

Embrace the weeds (which are usually UK a native plants and a great food source for insects).

https://www.rhs.org.uk/lawns/weed-control

Thank you for the responses so far!

I think most of the weeds I have are huge dandelions.

I am all for biodiversity but they are threatening to take over all the flowers and plants I have put around my pond and fruit trees and I can barely see any grass anymore.

I have also strawberries, rhubarb, blackberries, blueberries and blackcurrant growing in my back garden and I want to keep the dandelions away from them :).

I’ve just mowed the lawn and left clumps of pretty dandelions and ragged robin for the insects

could you mow a path through the lawn so it becomes obvious that your biodiverse lawn is on purpose?

I’ve done this on my back lawn. On my front lawn, instead of grass seed, I’ve planted creeping thyme, micro clover and geraniums. They all spread beautifully to provide ground cover, don’t grow high so don’t require mowing and they provide nectar for pollinators and ground cover for insects. Would that be an option?

I love my Fiskers weed puller. Agree it's best done after rain - there's a certain level of soil moisture that enables the roots to come out more easily.

Ooo please tell me more about your 'bad weed compost heap'. I always take my bad weeds to the tip but we have loads and I never thought of having a dedicated bad week heap. Do you have it in a separate place? Can you ever use the compost or do you just keep adding to it?

The other thing I've been trying is putting bad weeds in a large container and leaving them for rain to soak and rot down before tipping out on the border.

I'm quite overwhelmed by bad weeds so grateful for any advice and tips.

Something like the Wolf Garten weeding knife is good for dandelions @Seasidecatlady . Put it into the ground beside the rosette and try and tilt the root up. Depending on how the weather has been it'll come straight up, the whole root, and you'll be able to remove it and dispose of it outwith your compost bin. Or nothing will happen and you'll have to go all the way round the rosette and take a bigger clump up and fiddle till the bugger comes out. Sometimes you'll get the whole root, sometimes it'll leave a bit in the ground the bastard.

Never let the flower go to seed. If you don't have time to dig the root get the seedheads off before the wind makes like a child with a dandelion clock.

It's a lot of work. A lot. I've been working on mine for years but I am seeing results so it is worth it. My eye is now rather finely tuned for spotting a dandelion leaf at a hundred paces - OUT it comes.

And before anyone says "What about the bees?" I know! But there are gazillions of the yellow fuckers round here and I have much else to keep them happy in my little patch 🐝

Oo yes please, @Shedmistress can I second @ChasingCatsNotCars 's request for more info about the bad weed compost heap?

Use Weedol. It's pretty harmless as chemicals go. Once the weeds are dead the grass has a chance.

For me killing the weeds was 90% of the battle.