I guess that I first "got into lawns" when I was about 10 years old. We had a neighbor on Long Island named "Mr. Harper" that lived 7 or 8 houses down from us, and I would walk down the block just to check out the perfectly manicured Merion KBG lawn that he had. He would sometimes still be out working on it at dusk, and Id ask him a question or two about how he did what he did to his lawn. When he told me that there were no more than five things that he concerned himself with, Id walk back to my house thinking "hes lying he doesnt want to tell some stupid kid that walks around looking at lawns his secrets". I grew up and promised myself that I would someday have that lawn. After college and marriage, my wife and I moved to Stamford, CT and bought a house with a small lawn. Connecticut is famed for having land that is "1/3 poison ivy and 2/3 rock, or the other way around". Try as I might and spending as much as I could afford to, I couldnt make it turn into a lush lawn. I thought it was because I couldnt spend enough on chemicals and fertilizers. Then we moved to the Hudson Valley of NY. We love it. The soil was a little better, but the property of the front yard is heavily sloped, and completely surround by very large trees on three sides. I mean B-I-G trees 80 Firs, giant Oaks, and more enormous Maple trees than Carter has little liver pills. Throw in a Wild Cherry or two and a Beech tree for diversity. As I matured in my career and had a little more money to spend, and with some college classes in biochemistry I overcame the "its because I cant spend enough on the lawn". I owned more chemicals for the lawn than Ortho does. I learned to water properly (deep and deeper, and once a week) and could be found moving oscillating sprinklers before dawn and at 10pm at night. I have created many a new dance step moving sprinklers on a wet slope. I tried and eventually succeeded at getting a nice PR/KBG/FF lawn to the point that people said it was the best in the area. It wasnt enough. I still wanted Mr. Harpers Lawn. I nuked it and put in elite KBG (Moonlight/America KBG with some Oxford hard fescue for the shady areas). In the past 5 years Ive noticed that the chemical route doesnt really work well every year I need more chemicals and synthetic fertilizers than last year, and the soil problems got stranger and stranger. I added Google to the formula and became a lurker on GW. I found that if I spun down the chemicals and started to pay attention to the soil microbes, the "ever-more" cycle began to reverse itself. Im envious in a way of the ability of some of the regulars on GW to use corn meal and soy this-and-that, but I found that I have to still use synthetic fertilizer because Id need 3200 lbs of corn meal a year for my acre. Thats not going to happen. I have changed, though I now treat the necessary application of synthetic fertilizer as an "injury" that requires immediate "molasses treatments" to help the soil microbes recover from. I dabble with a few Jerry Baker items (I really like the use of Epsom Salt to affect lawn coloration, but Ive gone way past what Jerry does). Ive learned to mow higher and Ive learned that I will never overcome the shade of the big, beautiful trees that surround me (especially my love affair with "Bertha" the giant Norway Maple). My learnings: (1) Watering deep and infrequently causes the healthiest growth. (2) Mowing high is definitely better. (3) Fertilizer is important, and on large plots (1+ acre) you dont have many options to avoid synthetics. Treat the application of a synthetic fertilizer like a wound to the lawn that needs to be healed by doing what you can to help the soil microbes. I like careful molasses treatments and the use of compost to help it recover. (4) Get the lawn healthy enough that chemicals are only used for spot treatments. Treat the chemicals like major wounds. (5) "Google" is one of the best lawn tools ever made. The regulars on GW are right up there. (6) You are a "lawn crazy" when you consider whether a lawn tractor has good headlights so you can do work after darkness. (7) Trees are a part of a great lawn, and should not be treated as annoyances. Hacking them "to get more light in" is a politically-correct way to say partially kill the tree. (8) I will never have Mr. Harpers Lawn, but that is probably just a glorified fantasy that never existed in the real world. He probably had challenges too. Andys Lawn is OK, and Im fine with that. (9) The more I learn, the more I realize I have so much more to learn.

Question: - Have you done this for your home backyard cherry? Is it necessary? Yes, I've done it. NO, it's not necessary imo. - If I can not find ultra low biuret urea, is MG general purpose a reasonable alternative? it also contains certain micronutrients. If not, can you please recommend a safe product? Miracle Gro GP would be a suitable alternative. If your set on doing it follow MSU's guidelines for nitrogen % and adjust your mix rate accordingly. The high N lawn version would likely provide a better value, but you'd have to dilute to the appropriate N%. - What would be the formula rate for foliar application? (professional grower seems use urea 2% Follow the label and adjust accordingly. In my opinion (that's all this is) 2% isn't worth doing, you will see little to no benefit from this. Perhaps they mean 2% of pure urea N which is something like 46-0-0, so you'd be spraying a +/- 1% N dilution? I wasn't aware commercial growers applied fall foliar nitrogen. Everything I've ever read wanted nitrogen cut off well before winter to prevent trees from staying vegetative. This is to allow the tree to naturally harden off and go dormant. Not observing this or over-doing it could result in winter die-back. I've done this, but I think I way over-did it. This is just mho, and I'm certainly no expert. Personally, I'd skip this and early spring apply broadcast balanced fertilizer or an organic equivalent at the recommended rate. I'm not an expert though so I'll follow the thread and let the experts school both of us.

Diet Coke for me. If I'm out and they bring me pepsi instead they are the devil and I send it back and get mountain dew or some other citrusy thing pepsi makes. There is just no contest, I'll spend whatever it takes for DC. I also stay true to Jiff. :)

Regarding the herbal teas: I am a big fan of Celestial Seasonings -- Red Zinger, Mixed Berry Zinger. I make "refrigerator iced tea" -- just put a few packets in a plastic jug, add cold water, pop in the fridge and wait a few hours. Delish; no need to add Splenda or whatever. Last time I stocked up on them when they were on sale at the grocery store, the clerk probably thought I was reselling them on the black market or something! My other non-soda beverage of choice is cold water with something I've mentioned on a post here about favorite finds: True Lime, crystallized lime (they're the consistency of granulated sugar). Love that stuff.