The need to mow is directly related to the health of your soil. No surprises there! Add moisture to good soil and, while the temperatures reach 25°C and over, you can pretty much sit and watch the grass grow.
You can slow it down by causing it to be unhealthy. Not advised. Reasons your grass will do poorly include loss of moisture (dry weather and sprinkler avoidance). You might also be mowing wrongly.
Set your mowing height too low and you will scalp the lawn. To be blunt, you will cut into the plant too severely and damage it by reducing its ability to absorb goodness. In this condition, your grass can burn under the sun and its chance of recovery will be slim. Keep this up and the root structure of your lawn will also suffer.
The solution is to cut higher and more often. Depending on the type of grass in your lawn, the cutting height of your mower should typically be somewhere between 30 and 50 mm. Some species will handle mowing to 15mm but most would need 30mm minimum.
Your mower always needs sharp blades. Sharp blades cut. Dull blades cause ‘feathering’—ragged, damaged leaf edges. Instead of cutting, a dull blade will tear the leaf. Torn leaf edges lose moisture and promote disease. While we’re on the subject of better mowing and sharper blades, make sure you get rid of the sticks and stones and other debris that might cause damage to mower blades, not to mention windows and passing cars and creatures.
