Just received a call from my landlord. They wanted to know what I've done with regards to the weeds & have I engaged a gardener. They want to come down for another inspection next week.
Recap on what has been happening. The gardener came on Thursday morning when we were all away at work. He called hubs & told him that what we have is crab grass & it's a type of winter grass. It'll die off naturally when the temperature becomes higher. As long as we keep it short with regular mowing, it'll prevent it from seeding & from the problem recurring next winter. The issue with the lawn not thriving well is due to the presence of garden grubs that are eating the roots, therefore killing the lawn.
The priority is to get grub killer applied to the lawn, then spray the lawn with weed killer & fertilise it every 3 months to maintain it. The garden bed needs to be sprayed & a thick layer of mulch applied & resprayed with weed killers every 2 weeks.
This info I relate to my landlord. But I get the feeling that they're putting the pressure on to get it done by the time they come down again. I tried to hint that it's going to be raining for the next few days so we're very unlikely to get anything done. But seems like they're not accepting that as an "excuse" & wants us to mow the crab grass down asap. Then he jumped to the garden bed that's full of the crab grass as well.
Ok, I get you. We'll hand pull the crab grass from the garden bed as quickly as we can even if it means working in the rain. Coz the lawn has grub killer applied to it & needs a repeat application in 10 days. Then we have to wait 2 weeks before weed killer can be applied. Hubs is really in a foul mood after hearing all this. I tried my best & we've spent hundreds of dollars trying to fix up the lawn. I really don't know what else they want from us.
I think your landlord is being unreasonable. Your responsibility as a tenant is to keep the property in good order and keep the garden tidy and mowed. You are entitled to quiet enjoyment of the premises. If the landlord is so precious about some grass then perhaps they shouldn't rent it out.
ReplyDeleteI sense a bully,
ReplyDeleteYa, now we're stuck though. We just have to return it as it was rented out to us & our lease doesn't end till next May. Forcing us to get it done within days is impossible.
ReplyDeleteDon't worry about the time frame too much. Just tell him you will try and do them in the next week or two. I suspect he is asking you to mow them down to try and stunt their growth quickly. I think you should do that ASAP . Then do the grub spray and weed killer application. I am sure he will not make too much of a fuss as long as you do something within a reasonable time frame. Kicking you out is also not good for them as I think it will be hard for them to rent it out to others with a lawn like this.
ReplyDeleteThe gardener suggested we mow it coz when the crab grass gets too big, it starts to seed. While it won't grow now, the seeds will lay dormant till next winter & grow then. It grows super fast coz the last time it was mowed by my landlord, it took only 6 days for them to grow back 6 inches.
DeleteI think tenants are only responsible for maintenance and, in this case, mowing and weeding. If the grass have grubs, I think it becomes a repair issue which the landlord will have to be responsible. You might not have been able to see all these when you moved in as it was winter and everything is in hibernation. The other thing to remember is we only need to maintain the lawn to the standard at which we took over.
ReplyDeleteWe've already paid for the grub killer & used it on the lawn already. My husband & I work full time. So we can only do weeding over the weekends. But all my neighbours have weeds so I get weeds really fast over my side too. If I can't use weed n feed, I can't catch up with their growth by pulling them out manually.
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