Episode: #5 21/04/07
Presenter: Phil Dudman

Let’s face it, a lush and green lawn looks better than a brown one but in these times of widespread water restrictions the big question is, is there still a place for lawns in our gardens? Well, yes there is but how can you keep your lawn looking greener for longer with nothing but natural rainfall?
One of the simplest things you can do is aerate the soil with a garden fork. When it rains, the water will run deep into the holes, which means you will retain more moisture and your turf stays greener longer. It is a good idea to keep a bag of fertiliser handy to throw on when it rains.

Modern lawn fertilisers are slow release types so you get 3 months of feeding and they have a wetting agent as well, which will help your soil absorb the water and nutrients more efficiently.
There is a lot of developmental work being done on turf and here at the DPI Turf Research centre in Redlands, scientists like Matt Roche are busy trailing a range of varieties for their drought hardiness and there is some good news on the way.

Matt Roche: So what we have is some blue couch grass which is excellent for drought tolerance it is going to be the perfect grass for the future. In our current breeding project that we will have starting in a few months, blue and green couch grass are the ones we are looking to use. We are hoping to find the optimum turf grass that requires less water and less nutrition as well.

So with a bit of good lawn care and all this research going on the future for turf lovers looks pretty green.