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Yeah! It's been doing that for a week and a half straight! Nuff said!

Which also means I haven't been able to do anything in the yard for a week and a half, and that's just, that's just seriously depressing.

Yo what up mates! Thanks for coming back for another lawn care video.

The Bermuda in the front yard is really over grown and in desperate need of a cut but we have to wait for this rain to clear out, because ain't nobody got time to mow in the rain. And we've got this little problem right...here...popping up. Which we're going to have to address as soon as the rain clears out.

Same with the fescue. Really overgrown and in desperate need of a cut, but the color is great. And the Poa Annua's almost all gone.

It's some what tapered off right now but its suppose to just do this on and off all day today, and throughout the rest of this week. So I figured I would take this opportunity while the weather's crappy and can't really do anything outside and circle back to episode four and discuss some of the things we talked about in that video.

That one's being really funky for some reason. I don't really know what's going on with that. Some people are saying they can't watch it on certain browsers or mobile devices. I just, I don't know what's going on with that one. So, again, we'll highlight what we talked about in that video for this video, as well as cover what today's topic is about, the cost of doing your own lawn care.

And I'm mainly going to focus on the pre and post emergents side of things because those are the two basic chemicals that you need to put down in the yard. You've got fertilizers and grass seeds and all of that kind of stuff. Those are additional costs but I just want to focus in on those chemicals because that's one of the major costs in doing lawn care.

But before getting into that conversation, let me circle back to what we discussed in episode four. That one was all about the equipment you need. And there's really two basic pieces of equipment that you need to take care of your yard. A spreader and a sprayer. And quick note and disclaimer, we're not getting paid or endorsed by the company to show off these products, these are the ones that I just happen to purchase and use in my own yard.

So when it comes to spreaders, obviously get the one that's going to fit your need and the size yard that your tackling. I personally like this one for a few reasons. One, it has the edge guard control on here so I can make trim passes in the yard and I'm not throwing product on the sidewalk and wasting it. It's also got the nice large rubber tires with good tread on it so I can get a good grip on the yard and I'm not slipping and sliding all over the place like some of the other cheaper ones that just have plastic wheels. It's also got a nice big hopper so  you can put a lot of product in there. This one can hold up to 80 pounds. So, like I said, put a lot in there and get everything down in one fail swoop if I needed to. It's got a shut off lever so I can close the gate while I'm moving to different areas in my yard and again I'm not wasting product on the sidewalk or driveway. And it's also got a calibration dial right here so I can either make the gate or the hole opening either larger or bigger depending on the size granular or the size prile that I'm dealing with.

Now the other critical piece of equipment that I mentioned in episode four that you're going to need, is a sprayer. Now when I did that episode I had a manual pump four gallon back pack sprayer. I've since ditched that and gone with a battery powered sprayer and man am I glad I did that! Not only because it just got exhausting but what's awesome about the battery powered sprayers, is you get a nice constant even spray out of the sprayer. With the other one I had to manually pump it to try and keep the spray consistent and it just wasn't. I was hovering anywhere between 15 and 20 psi. This one gives me a continual spray pattern. It doesn't deviate from that unless I shut off the pump.

Again just pick the sprayer that's going to fit your needs. Because I have 6,400, roughly 6,500 square feet that I'm dealing with, I didn't want to have to stop and fill up mixtures a whole lot. So that's why I went with a four gallon. I only have to fill this up, like, two and a half times to treat my whole yard. And the battery on this last for a good while. I think I've done four applications, so far. Yeah, four I think. And the battery is still going strong. So pretty happy with the battery powered sprayer.

Lighting in here is really bad so sorry if it seems grainy or whatever. So, this is where I store all of my pest control products, and down here is where I store all of my lawn and garden products or chemicals that I use. So, keep the lids tightly closed, keep them in this cabinet, so that it's not in direct sunlight. And the temperatures don't fluctuate a whole lot out here in the garage, so, this is a good storage solution for me.

Alright, so let me break down what it costs to spray a pre and post emergent in my yard. Keep in mind it's for my yard, so take that for what it is. But these are, again, the two basic chemicals you need to get your yard looking good. So let's start off with our Pre Emergent here.

So our pre emergent is 64 ounces and it cost a $152.00 and I apply it at .3 ounces per 1,000 square feet. So if I take the 64 ounces and divide by .3, I'm roughly going to get about 213 applications out of each bottle. So, one bottle should cover about 213,000 square feet. So if I take the 213,000 and divide it by my yard, 6,500, I'm going to get about 32 total applications out of this bottle.

So to figure out the cost per application, and, yeah, I totally screwed it up right here, so ignore that. So $152 divided by 213, gives me roughly 71 cents for one application for a 1,000 square feet. So I want to take that 71 cents, I'm going to multiply it by 6.5 because I'm going to have to do it 6 and a half times for my 6,500 square foot yard, and it's roughly going to cost me $4.62, per application for the pre emergent.

So on to my post emergent. That is 128 ounces and I apply it at 1 ounce per 1,000 square feet and it cost $88.51. So the 128 ounces should cover 128,000 square feet. Divide that by my yard, 6,500, and I should be able to get 19 applications out of the one bottle.

So again to figure out the cost, if I take the $88.51 and divide it by the 128 applications that I should get, it's going to cost about 70 cents for one application per 1,000 square feet. So again, I'm going to take the 70 cents, multiply that by 6.5 because I have a 6,500 square foot yard, and that's going to be about $4.55 per application on the post emergent.

So let's take the cost of my pre emergent per application and add that to the post emergent per application, and that's going to give me $9.17 every time I go to make an application with my pre and post emergent.

Now contrast that $9.17 to my neighbor across the way who pays $150 a month for somebody to do the exact same thing.

So, yeah, no question in my mind as to what route to go. I like saving money, I like doing this myself, so, that's why I do my own lawn care.

And yeah, I know I didn't factor in the cost of the spreader or the sprayer, but that's a one and done type thing. You buy it, you're done. You don't have to buy it again so long as you maintain it, keep it clean, and just treat it nicely.

And because the cost is so low to buy these concentrates, mix them up, and spray them myself, I can afford to do the fungicide applications, get the seed to overseed in the back yard, I can get the fertilizers that I want, I just have more money to play with to get my yard looking this good.

So there you go, I hope that wasn't too confusing and you followed along with that. I hope I didn't lose you in the math and the numbers. I just wanted to do that so that you could see how much money you actually save by doing this stuff yourself.

Hopefully this rain will clear out. Looks like it kind of is, but they said it was suppose to be thunderstorms for the rest of the day. So, weather predictions, you just, you, mother nature.

If you want to know more about the products that I use, I'll leave the links in the description box below so you can click over to Do My Own dot com, read more about those in depth. And if you have any other questions on anything I touched on in this video, like I always say, leave those in the comments section below, email the customer service staff, or pick up the phone, give us a call.

And if you're not already, click that button right there to subscribe to the channel, you can click this playlist to see all the videos in the Do My Own Lawn Care series, and click this playlist to see all the videos in the Do My Own Gardening series.

And I can't wait for the rain to finally roll out of here so I can get back to maintaining my yard, making it look really good. Also, thanks for watching!