SUMMER SPARKLE FOR LAWNS WESTERNERS have learned that a lawn affords greater pleasure than any other type of garden. It gives practically twelve months of use and beauty year after year. living — the barbecues, Summer is the time a lawn is used the most. That is the season of greatest outdoor the games, the parties and even the siestas. Of all gardening wishes, people want most to have a cool, green inviting lawn throughout the summer. It can be a reality instead of only a mid- summer dream. Feed It — If you want grass to be a sparkling green it must be healthy. To be healthy it has to have nourishment; not stimulants but a solid meal. Nourishing food is complete and well balanced. Nitrogen gives sparkle and "zing" to a lawn. Phosphorous builds strong roots to support the top- growth. Potassium adds tone and vigor. When these are provided in the right forms they are mild and long lasting. That means the ingredients must be organic as well as chemical—a happy combination that feeds without burn- ing, that is clean and free from un- pleasant odors, effective yet economical. Lawns grow the year round so they need food constantly. Your lawn does not have a chance to show what it can do unless fed spring, summer and fall with Turf Builder. Contrary to some beliefs summer feeding with the right material is safe. So roll out the Scotts Spreader, set it at mark 5 and give an energizing meal of good Turf Builder to rid your lawn of that tired look. Water It — A scorched earth can not be expected to produce any better turf than roses. Grass has to have moisture too, but how much and how often de- pends on enough different things that each individual lawn will have its own requirements. Although grass roots can penetrate one or two feet under ideal conditions, the lawn is largely dependent on the top six inches of soil for its room and board. This is the layer to keep moist. It is one key to proper watering. The type of soil is another. Sandy and gravelly soils need to be watered frequently instead of heavily. Clay soils need water less often but more at a time. Thus porous soils may require sprinkling three or four times a week but heavy soils only once or twice. Whenever the top half inch of earth shows signs of drying, the time is ripe to provide more moisture. Heavy clay soils such as adobe quick- ly shrink and crack if allowed to thirst. This makes air vents that aggravate drying and it is hard to close them up. Start watering before cracking occurs. Turf in full sun, sloping toward the sun or subjected to daily winds will dry out faster and therefore need more fre- quent watering. Don't apply water at a faster rate than your soil absorbs it. On sloping areas it results in runoff and the lawn is deprived of its share. On level areas it results in puddling, then under the misconception that the soil is saturated the water is turned off before the lawn has had enough. Most lawns are just as well watered one time of day as another. The idea that it is bad to water grass in the hot sun bobs up repeatedly. Actually, mid- day is a good time to water because it tends to cool the soil and grass plants. Banish Weeds — They need no longer be a headache. Most all of them can be kept out with scarcely a lick of work, simply by spreading 4-XD for the broadleaved types like Bur Clover, Jap- anese Clover and Dandelions. It is easy and safe to use and one or two applications a year keep a lawn clean and weedfree. If your weed problem is Crabgrass— Scutl it. As Mr. DeGray relates on page 4, the Scutl treatment is not only the surest way but by far the easiest. Either Orchids To Scutl In our mail these past weeks have been clip- pings and comments from lawnthusiasts about a feature article in one of the import- ant national home and garden magazines which had conducted a contest called "How I Licked Crabgrass." Our well wishers were as pleased as we that the first and second prize winners used SCUTL and gave it major credit for their successful battle against Crabgrass. Mention was made too of the geographical adaptability of SCUTL with one winner on the East Coast, the other in New Mexico. As one reader summed it up—"Take a bow SCUTL, you have slain the Dragon" 4-XD or Scutl is applied in a few min- utes with a Scott Spreader which you can buy or rent at leading garden sup- ply stores. Control Pests — The West has more than its share of insects. Fortunately, lawns are not bothered by such a variety as plagues garden plants. The principal summertime lawn pests are Sod Web worms (Lawn Moth Larvae), Ants and Earwigs. They can all be readily controlled and outdoor living made much more pleasant. Just fill the Scotts Spreader with Lawn & Turf Pest Control and make a quick easy trip across the lawn. Now — Take It Easy — To have a good lawn you formerly had to be an alchem- ist, measuring, proportioning, and mak- ing up mystic solutions. No more. The modern lawn care aids come ready to use. You need only to put them on. Three basic tools are needed to main- tain a good lawn—a mower, a sprinkler and a spreader. Newest and most wel- come of these is the spreader for it emancipates the home owner and allows him to enjoy his lawn instead of slaving over it. Simply (a) dump the ready-to- use material in the hopper, (b) set the spreader for proper flow and (c) walk across the lawn. By following this program you can have a sparkling lawn in the summer when you use it most. Effect of a Wet Spring As LAWN CARE goes to press, folks are talking about the unusual spring with its cool temperatures and frequent rainfall through April and May. It could affect your lawn in these ways: Lots of rain leaches plant nutrients down through the soil and increases the need to give your lawn a summer feeding. Cool damp weather also brings on fungus diseases, causing brown spots or dark rings in lawns. Scutl comes to the rescue because its mercury content is one of the best fungicides. One or two applications at two week intervals are suggested. Scutl is quick and easy to apply. Extended cool springs may be fol- lowed by a quick jump into hot sum- mer. If that happens, raising the height of cut provides added protection to soft, lush grass. Send for these free timely sum- mer lawn discussions if they are not already in your garden file: Lawn Food is a Turf Builder — lawns feeding (about 114PS efficiently) Wise Watering—12 3PS (moisture without waste) Lawn Weeds out of Style—127PS the easy way) (about weeding Crabgrass—122PS (about Scutling this grass weed) Keep your Lawn Pest Free—105PS (sure cure for bugs) Perk Up Parched Lawns— 117PS grass) for sun-tanned (treatment Streamlined Spreaders New streamlined models of Scotts Spreaders are now in production. They are more compact, lighter in weight, yet sturdier than ever. A new agitator has been developed so the handy machine can now be used to spread lime and gypsum quite evenly. Chlordane Chlordane Caution insecticides is generally accepted as the best of modern for use on lawns. More and more people are using chlordane products for control of turf in- sects. Furthermore Chlordane is now being suggested for Crabgrass control. However, the results of our researches on clay and loam soils have that excessive applications have a tendency to build up concentrations which are harmful to turf. The injury is of a delayed nature. indicated crabgrass of weeds (i.e. before sprouts and before control if applied time the harmful Scutl Has Many Uses 1. Controls growing 2. Pre-emergence appear) grasses sprouting Controls fungus diseases to grass Improves sirable grass varieties Repeated usage reduces growth of algae and moss. color and vigor of de- 3. 4. 5. activity of just The Crabgrass And I from many sources is a digest Customarily Lawn Care of material and is written by our staff. But this page from the garden diary of R. J. DeGray was too good to keep. He has not only told his story well but with feeling. That is why we asked him to share it. ED. in 1948 When we moved into our present home I surveyed the long-neglected lawn, feeling something like Old MacDonald, with "here a little crabgrass, there a little crabgrass, everywhere some crabgrass." But the situation was not one to sing about so we promptly set to work and our garden diary for 1949 and 1950 records the blow by blow account of what seemed a losing battle. We tried to pull it up with our bare hands, only to find that every time we uprooted a stalk at the northeast corner of the lawn, a seedpod shook at the southwest corner. We tried herky-jerky mowing, mowing from different direc- tions, and one of us raked ahead of the mower in a vain attempt to chop off the raised stems before they could seed. The result was a herky-jerky backache and just as much crabgrass as ever. Then, in 1951, we tried Scotts Scutl (phenyl mercuric acetate). According to our diary it was applied on June 25. It rained on June 26 and kept it up for three days. Scutl was applied again on July 1, just after a light rain, followed by four days of clear weather. By July 7 we felt like setting off a belated fire-cracker for here and there the crabgrass was turning light green and then the sickly yellow that foretold its eventual demise. By last year our determina- tion to lick crabgrass knew no bounds so we went into experimenting. We used Scutl again on the east lawn but reserved the west lawn for parallel testing of other treatments. The appli- cation was on July 5, following a light hose sprinkling to help adherence of the compound to the blades of grass. The second application was made on July 12, again after a sprinkling. There was no rain until July 17. These good conditions gave ideal results. Occa- sional patches of surviving crabgrass were glaringly obvious and so few that we easily pulled them out by hand. No such success with our test area, the west lawn. An initial treatment with a liquid applied as a spray failed com- pletely and by August 1 the lawn was a mass of crabgrass. Next we tried a powder de- signed for spray application when crabgrass is mature. We followed directions exactly, even to measuring off areas of 135 square feet, each to re- ceive 5 teaspoons in dilution. Applica- tion was made with a sprinkling can . . . how my arms and back ached. By August 9 the crabgrass was as healthy as ever. The next time we used a commercial sprayer that wet down every last blade of grass. The whole job took back-breaking hours — never again! The results were fine for six days but before frost a whole new gen- eration was flourishing. The Scutl-ed east lawn, however, stayed completely free of the hated intruder. O M S C O TT & SONS CO. M A R Y S V I L LE - - O H IO E V E RT P A C K A GE OF S C O T TS L A WN C A RE P R O D U C TS B E A RS T H IS T R A DE - MARK A ND <£> P S - 7 43 IS S E A L ED FOR YOUR P R O T E C T I ON 6 - 2 - 53