Your spring lawn cleanup checklist for Green Bay

Every March, the same question lands in our inbox: "What should I be doing in the yard right now?" The honest answer is "it depends on what's happening outside this week" — but here's the actual sequence we follow on our own properties and on most of our maintenance accounts in Green Bay.

Week one: wait. Seriously.

The single most damaging thing you can do to a Wisconsin lawn in early spring is to walk on it — or worse, rake it — when the soil is still saturated from snowmelt. Wait until you can press a finger into the lawn and not have it spring back wet. For most of Brown County, that's somewhere between mid-March and the first week of April depending on the year.

Week two: light cleanup

Once the turf is dry enough to walk on without leaving footprints, do a gentle hand-rake to lift matted grass and remove the worst of the leaves and twigs. Avoid power dethatchers this early — the crowns of the grass are still fragile.

Week three: edges and beds

Re-cut your bed edges with a half-moon edger or a sharp spade. Pull any weeds that emerged under the snow (creeping Charlie loves this window). Apply a pre-emergent if you're battling crabgrass — the timing window in Green Bay is usually when forsythia is in full bloom.

Week four: first cut

Set the mower to its highest setting for the first cut of the season — never lower than 3.5". The first cut should remove no more than the top third of the blade. Bag the clippings this one time only; for the rest of the season, mulch them.

Mulch comes last

Wait until the soil has warmed to about 55°F before laying fresh mulch — usually mid-May here. Mulching too early traps cold in the soil and slows perennial emergence. Two inches is plenty; more than three inches starts smothering roots.

What we'd skip this year

Don't bother with crabgrass pre-emergent if you overseeded last fall — it'll prevent your new grass from germinating. Don't apply lime without a soil test. And please don't power-rake a healthy lawn just because the ad says to.

Need help? Get on our spring cleanup list — we usually fill the schedule by the second week of March.