Natural Grub Control
Is your lawn being taken over by grubs? We make grub control easy! Our natural grub control methods rely on building soil health to promote a strong soil microbiome!
Grubs
Slimy, curled up bodies with transparent skin wiggling around like they just crawled out of a horror movie. Unpleasant looking is an understatement, and that’s just the beginning. Japanese beetle grubs are every bit as destructive as they are ugly. Chewing away at the roots of turf until large dead patches appear in the lawn, grubs are then followed by racoons or other mammals that can smell the protein rich insect larvae from blocks away. The racoons dig up the grubs uprooting any remaining turf, completing the process of destruction in the lawn and inflaming humiliation in a neighborhood near you.
Beneficial Nematodes
Luckily there is a natural grub control solution that will kill the grubs and restore your lawn at the same time. The secret is in the soil. Microscopic worms called nematodes are the natural enemy of grubs. Nematodes carry bacteria on their bodies that is toxic to grubs. Nematodes are so small that they can worm their way into the bodies of the grubs, bringing their toxic payload like a trojan horse. As the grubs die, the nematodes get busy. In what could only be described as a Caligulan orgy, the nematodes feast on the dead grub, engage in sexual reproduction, and lay hundreds of eggs for cute little baby nematodes inside the dead grub. As the grub disintegrates the nematodes escape into the surrounding soil on the hunt for ever more larval victims.
Soil Health Solution
Nematodes only thrive in healthy soils. For nematodes to be an effective natural grub control, the soil system needs plenty of fungi and bacteria. Fungi and bacteria work together to give soils a sponge-like texture, pushing and holding particles of sand, silt, and clay apart from one another. Soils with fungi infiltrate and hold much more water than soils without fungi. Nematodes live in and move through the thin layer of water that surrounds soil particles in a healthy soil system.
Natural Grub Control Treatment Options
Our natural grub control options are easy and effective:
Moderate Restoration
Three treatments per year – for three years.
Three times per year we aerate, seed, and spray compost extract combined with nematode eggs into the lawn. We repeat this for three years in a row delivering a total of nine treatments. Over the course of treatments your lawn will begin to recover and by the third year you’ll have a thriving turf with grubs under control. This “Moderate Restoration” plan is among our most popular services because it works to kill grubs and restore lawns without breaking the bank. One benefit of the moderate restoration is that it doesn’t require our clients to water, instead building up a seed bank in the soil that sprouts when sufficient rainfall occurs. Moderate restoration can also be preferred if you have kids or dogs that need to maintain access to the lawn all season long.
Rapid Restoration
For clients who need a faster solution for natural grub control we also offer our “Rapid Restoration” service. In a rapid restoration we strip away any dead sod or weeds, aerate, seed, compost, seed again, and cover with a seed blanket. This all happens in one visit. Then we provide watering directions based on air temps. Rapid restorations tend to do cost more and require watering to establish but they have the benefit of much quicker satisfaction.
Seed Options
There are more options for turf selection than there used to bee. A bee lawn combines clover and other blooming ground covers with no-mow grass, to create a low-maintenance lawn option that supports the long-term health of soils better than most traditional lawn seed blends. Bee lawns avoid the mono-culture of traditional turf and rely on a blend of drought resistant plants that won’t require irrigation, fertilization, mowing, or pesticides to maintain. Overall bee lawns tend to grow more robust soil fungal networks than traditional lawns and tend to have fewer grub problems.
Soil Nerds
To restore soil health, we infuse the eggs of nematodes in a liquid compost extract. First we make highly fungal compost in small batches at our warehouse. We extract fungal spores into a liquid compost extract then we combine this with lab-raised nematode eggs and spray this solution on our client’s lawns. This might sound like the kind of work only a soil nerd would practice, and that’s us! We’re soil nerds!!
Grubs can’t take over in lawns with healthy soil and healthy soil is the foundation of our lawn services.
Contact Minnehaha Falls Landscaping today to schedule an on-site consultation so we can start controlling grubs naturally in your lawn!
