3 Reasons You Have Clover in Your Lawn

One of the most common questions from homeowners is how to get rid of clover in lawns. Clover is a perennial weed that’s prolific across Canada. Clover remains green when your lawn turns brown. Some homeowners find the white flowers produced by clover unsightly, and the flowers do attract bees. Clover can be very difficult to eradicate and requires several treatments throughout the season.

Do You Have Clover?

First, how do you tell if your lawn has clover? You could scour your yard for the 3-leaf plant (not to be confused with black medic and oxalis that also have 3-leaf patterns). Even easier than that, white clover puts out little white flowers. If these flowers are present on your lawn, if bees are attracted to these flowers, you have white clover.

The reason clover flourishes in your lawn is that the growing conditions favour it more than the grass. Let the experts at Nutri-Lawn Burlington help tip the scales and give your grass the advantage!

Advantage #1: Nitrogen

Nitrogen is an important component of any fertilizer, it’s what makes plants green. Because of a bacteria present in its roots, clover can absorb nitrogen from the air. This is why the clover will remain green while your lawn turns brown. A lawn that hasn’t been fertilized or soil low in nitrogen provides ideal growing conditions for clover to outperform grass.

Advantage #2: Low Mower Deck

Another advantage clover has over your grass is that it doesn’t mind being mown short. Mowing stresses your lawn, keeping your grass mown short gives clover a head start – over and over. Many times on our blog we have recommended that homeowners keep their grass a little longer in order to help the grass stay healthy. Raising the deck on your mower and keeping your grass a little longer evens the playing field, so to speak, and helps your grass get ahead.

Advantage #3: It’s A Perennial

Clover is a perennial which means that it will come back next year unlike some other weeds. It spreads prolifically and grows in unsightly clumps. Miss one clump or ignore it and the clover will come back year after year and continue to have the advantage over your grass.

Chemical Solution

We would love to help you get rid of the clover in your lawn. It’s fairly easy to get rid of clover, but it will require some patience and multiple applications. There are chemicals on the market we can use to eradicate the clover from your lawn.

Organic Solution

Not everyone is comfortable spraying chemicals on their lawn. There are organic options to get rid of clover but it will require more work and patience. We would be happy to discuss available options.

The organic option is less about killing the clover and more about helping your grass perform better and crowd out the intruder. Because clover can produce its own nitrogen it has a head start over a lawn low in nitrogen, so adding fertilizer and overseeding multiple times a year will help your lawn perform better. Clover thrives when mown short but keeping your lawn mown short stresses grass. Mowing your grass at a higher level gives the grass the advantage it needs.

Whatever you decide is best for your lawn, do not hesitate to contact the lawn care experts at Nutri-Lawn Burlington to help you create the look you want. Contact Nutri-Lawn Burlington for a complimentary quote.