Effective Bed Maintenance Tips for a Beautiful Lawn

The flowers (and other plants) you have in your yard are likely a big reason why you enjoy your lawn. Taking care of these plants means taking care of the beds that house them. And by maintaining your plant beds, you improve the overall look of your lawn. In this post, we’ll provide some effective bed maintenance tips for a beautiful lawn. These are tips we’ve learned over the years from maintaining our own flower beds and helping our customers maintain theirs.

First things first: Bed maintenance starts by creating a plant bed. To begin, place a bed covering around your plants. Then, it’s time to spread out mulch (the process of which is called mulching).

Why mulching matters

There two primary benefits mulching provides:

1. Mulching prevents weed growth. Weeds need sunlight to grow. To block sunlight from reaching the weeds, spread out mulch. Unfortunately, mulching doesn’t mean weeds won’t grow at all, but it will help keep them from getting out of hand. 
2. Mulching helps with moisture retention. When you water your plants or when it rains, you want to ensure your plants retain that water. Mulching helps ensure this happens by absorbing and retaining the water in your plant beds.

Now you know the “why,” behind mulching, let’s talk about the type of mulch you actually need. 

What kind of mulch is available?

There are four types of mulches we recommend:

1. Pine straw. Specifically, we recommend longleaf pine straw because it lasts longer than other pine straw mulches.
2. Hardwood mulch or pine bark mulch. These can be either shredded or chipped.
3. Rubber mulch. This comes in the form of little chunks, is made from recycled rubber materials (such as tires), and lasts a long time. 
4. Synthetic pine straw. While this lasts a long time, it looks fake when you get close to it (from a distance it typically looks fine).

No matter what type of mulch you choose, make sure you distribute it evenly throughout the bed. We recommend spreading a layer that’s approximately 2-4 inches deep.

How often should I put out mulch?

Mulching twice a year is a good rule of thumb. So, do it first in March or April and refresh your bedding in September or October.

To reiterate, mulching won’t completely get rid of your weeds. And these weeds can take over your beds once they get established. So, weeding is critical for bed maintenance. 

How we recommend weeding

While pulling weeds by hand is eco-friendly, it’s incredibly labor-intensive. For instance, if you pull certain species of weed by hand, they multiply faster. The seeds come out as spores and can spread across the dirt. This means if you pull one weed up, two days later you will have a lot more. All that to say, pulling weeds can require a lot of work from you (or your child, if you’re having them help).

Instead of pulling weeds, we recommend using a spray herbicide. This will work for most types of weeds. Using small amounts of herbicide shouldn’t hurt your plants or your health. Just make sure you appropriately measure the amount you plan to use, per the directions on the herbicide you purchase.

What type of herbicide should I use?

Without getting too much in the weeds about this (pun intended), we typically recommend going with an herbicide that uses either glyphosate or 2,4-D. The brand doesn’t matter–just make sure either glyphosate or 2,4-D is the active ingredient. Herbicides with glyphosate are the most common for keeping weeds out of flower beds, but either active ingredient works for most turfs.

Wrapping Up

Keeping up with your plant beds may seem like a lot of hard work (and it can be), but we hope these bed maintenance tips have helped you see how you can do it efficiently and effectively. And if you don’t want to maintain your beds on your own, download the Mow & Blow app or start using it directly on this site to get free quotes from multiple lawn and landscaping pros near you.

As always, keep checking this blog for more helpful lawn maintenance tips.