Lawn care for Nashville's narrow lots

How an East Nashville lot changes the job

Nashville yards are not Smyrna yards. Inside the older ring, in East Nashville, Salem Town, Sylvan Park and Twelve South, you get bungalows and small Craftsman houses on deep narrow lots, an alley at the back, a sidewalk at the front and a strip of grass between the walk and the curb that nobody thinks about until it is shaggy. Add the newer infill, two tall houses where one cottage used to sit, and the mowing is mostly turns.

That shape decides the work. A gate into a side yard is often barely wider than a mower, so a good share of the job is trimmer work along fence lines and around tree roots that have lifted up out of the clay. There is usually a strip behind a detached garage where nothing turns. Skip those and the yard reads as cut from the street and rough everywhere a person actually walks, which is the part your neighbors see when they pass on the sidewalk.

We already run into Nashville from the shop in Smyrna, and some of that work has been whole properties rather than a single yard, a pair of houses over in Salem Town that needed getting back in order. Keith Setler put it this way after we worked his yard: "On time and professional. Really detailed attention to every inch of our yard and even took care of things we didn’t ask for. Will definitely keep on rotation." That is the standard, whether the lot runs wide or comes down to a sliver beside the driveway.

• Mower matched to the gate before we start
• Trimmer run along fence lines and lifted roots
• Sidewalk and curb strip edged every visit
• Cut height raised when the heat sets in
• Walks and alley blown clean before we leave

Why fescue gives up in a Nashville summer

Middle Tennessee sits in the transition zone, which is a polite way of saying no grass is truly happy here. Most Nashville yards are tall fescue, a cool season grass that does its growing in spring and fall and then has to survive July and August. Humid nights, warm soil and a lawn that stays damp after a thunderstorm are exactly what brown patch wants, and it will take out a stand of fescue in a shaded back yard fast.

So the mower setting matters more here than most people expect. Cut fescue short in June and you take the shade off its own crown, the soil surface heats up, and the plant spends what little energy it has left holding on instead of putting down roots. We raise the deck going into the heat and keep the blade sharp, because a dull blade tears the leaf instead of cutting it and leaves a whitish tip that browns out by the next morning.

Then there is the shade. A lot of the older streets have big oaks and maples that were there long before the houses got redone, and grass under a mature canopy is thin no matter who mows it. Newer builds on open lots often run bermuda or zoysia instead, which loves the heat and wants the opposite treatment, cut lower and cut often. Part of the first visit is working out which grass you actually have and mowing it the way that grass wants.

Weed control and mulch on Nashville clay

The dirt under most of this city is heavy clay sitting on limestone, and it packs down hard where people park, walk or let a dog run the same line. Compacted ground grows thin turf, and thin turf is an open invitation. Chickweed and henbit come up over winter and are already flowering when everyone else is still waiting on spring, crabgrass moves into the hot bare edges along the drive, and nutsedge shows up in the low corner that never quite drains.

Weed control is mostly about timing and about not letting the lawn get thin in the first place. Once crabgrass has seeded into a bare strip you are not fixing that strip this year, you are managing it and rebuilding the turf around it. That is why we would rather talk about mowing height and the shape of the cut than sell you a spray for every weed you can name. A dense lawn crowds out most of what would otherwise get in.

Mulch does the same job in the beds. A bed that is covered keeps seed from starting, holds water through a dry August stretch and stops the clay crusting over. It has to be done right though. Mulch piled against a trunk holds moisture on bark that was never meant to stay wet, and a bed with no cut edge just bleeds mulch into the grass. Elizabeth Earls had us clear her front beds and level them so planting later would be easier, and the edge gets cut before any mulch goes down.

Getting a price in Nashville

Call (615) 987-9982 or send the form with your street and a rough idea of what the yard looks like. The estimate is free, you get it in writing, and the mowing is priced apart from any bed work so you can take all of it or only the part you want. If the yard needs a look in person before we can price it properly, we come out and look at it, and nothing starts until you have said yes to the number in front of you.