HELOISE: Tips help maintain healthy lawns

Dear Readers: How does your lawn look? Here are some helpful hints for maintaining a healthy lawn.

When watering the lawn, give it a good soaking. Watering for too short a time or not using enough water leads to shallow, weaker roots. Watering at night or very early in the morning is better for the lawn and your water bill, because less water will be lost to evaporation.

Before mowing, look at the lawn to check for disease. Patches that are darker, droopy, wilted, bald or brown can signal that there may be disease. Remember that some cooler-season grasses will start to brown during the hot summer months.

The lawn does go through cycles to protect it from drought and excessive heat. This is normal, and one reason that the lawn might be brown.

Sharpen your lawn-mower blades once a year; dull blades don’t cut the grass well!

If you have specific questions about your lawn, contact a plant nursery, cooperative extension service or your local university’s plant-pathology department.

Heloise

Dear Heloise: I was cutting down my travel file and discovered that many of the road maps I had didn’t have a date on the front of them, especially those from hotel chains. A date would be so helpful in deciding which ones were outdated.

Sally in New Mexico

Dear Heloise: I worked in a veterinarian clinic for many years, and the doctor never had time to drink coffee. Then he took in a partner, and the first thing he did was buy a coffee maker, and I learned to make coffee. I don’t drink it, and my husband uses instant.

After a while, the coffeepot became clogged with mineral deposits, and I decided to clean it with vinegar. Well, apparently I didn’t get it rinsed out, and when the vet took a drink, he spit it out. He didn’t care for my “pickled coffee”!

Joan Huddleston, Laurel, Neb.

I love vinegar, but vinegary coffee is not on my “tasty” list! Vinegar is fabulous for so many things. For lots of other money-saving, easy-to-make cleaning solutions you might want to look at, send for my six-page Fantabulous Vinegar Hints and More pamphlet. To receive a copy, just send $5 and a long, self-addressed, stamped (61 cents) envelope to: Heloise/Vinegar, P.O. Box 795001, San Antonio, TX 78279-5001. For most cleaning jobs, use the cheap white or cider vinegar, and in cooking and foods, use the wine, malt and balsamic varieties.

Heloise

Dear Heloise: Here is a hint for those stubborn, tiny corks that are used to plug up shakers for salt and pepper. Often the corks dry up and shrink or get pushed into the shaker so far that it’s impossible to get them out. Soft, foam earplugs to the rescue! Squeeze an earplug and put it in the hole, and it will expand to fit.

H.N., via e-mail

King Features Syndicate