The Spruce | By Lauren Jarvis-Gibson | 10/06/24
Fall is here and that means care for your lawn and garden will differ greatly from the spring and summer months. As colder temperatures roll in, it may be time to start prioritizing other gardening tasks and stop others like mowing your lawn.
Luckily, gardening pros are here to set the record straight on when you should officially stop mowing your lawn, read on for more information.
Why Mowing Your Lawn Is Important
Mowing your lawn isn’t just for superficial reasons or to be the best looking lawn on the block. Mowing your lawn properly and frequently will help keep your grass at the right height, allowing nutrient absorption and deep root growth. It also helps prevent any insect damage and diseases in your yard.
Why You Should Stop Mowing Your Lawn
Most experts say that your lawn usually needs to be kept at a height of 2 ½ to 3 inches all year long. But, because grass and other plants grow at a much slower pace when the leaves start to fall and temperatures go from 70 degrees to around 50 degrees, many lawn experts agree that mowing your lawn is unnecessary.
The Ideal Timeline
So now to the bigger question: what is the perfect or ideal timeline for mowing your lawn, and when should you stop taking care of your grass? Although there is no “perfect” timeline, it’s suggested by experts to continue to mow your grass until you notice it not growing as rapidly. This will likely be around late October or early November when the temperatures drop below 50 degrees. But, it depends entirely on where you live. For some climates, you can continue to mow your lawn until early December.
Mowing your lawn prior to temperatures plummeting has been commonly suggested in the past as a way of reducing spring damage from snow molds and voles. However, cutting your grass too short will cause more of a stress to the grass than what your lawn will experience from diseases or animals.
If your usual mowing height for your lawn is 2.5 to 3 inches, experts at the University of Minnesota suggest keeping it exactly there. But, if the preferred height of your lawn is 3+ inches, then they would recommend bringing it down to 3 inches before winter (again this could be late October or early December depending on where you live).
Remember that your lawn will go into dormancy once temperatures get too cold, but don’t fret—your lawn and nature know what it’s doing. It will come out of dormancy once the air and soil temperatures rise come spring.
