Autumn lawn care: a couple of hours well spent on a sunny weekend

Autumn is the moment when the two extremes of the lawn spectrum – the neat and perfectly clipped and the wild, weedy and flowery – both benefit from some attention.

For neat ones (or to wrestle a lawn back to neatness), bring out the big guns of autumn lawn maintenance: a spring-tined rake, garden fork, stiff garden brush and bags of gritty sand, compost and seed. 

Scratch through the roots with the rake to remove moss and stimulate the roots, then mow to pick up the mess. Next, push the garden fork vertically down into the lawn all over, brush topsoil and gritty sand into the resultant holes to improve drainage, then scatter your compost and lawn seed into any bare patches. 

Your lawn will look terrible, but this is an eggs and omelettes situation. Next summer you will be sinking happy toes into springy turf. 

For those who, shall we say, manage their lawns with wildlife in mind, there are also a few things you can do now. If you’re going to have a lawn of weed flowers and patchy growth, why not go the whole hog and naturalise a few little bulbs to make it look deliberate? Dwarf narcissi (such as N. bulbocodium and N. cyclamineus) and all the crocuses and snowdrops are perfect choices. All but the snowdrops can be planted now. 

Choose an area that you are happy to leave unmown into late spring, carelessly scatter the bulbs to feign natural drifts, then slot them in wherever they fall using a bulb planter.

This is also a good time to sow meadow seed or to lay meadow turf, such as the glorious mixes from Pictorial Meadows (pictorialmeadows.co.uk) if you feel like abandoning all pretence at lawn. 

The Almanac: A Seasonal Guide to 2018 by Lia Leendertz (Unbound, £9.99) is out now. To order your copy for £7.99 plus p&p call 0844 871 1514 or visit books.telegraph.co.uk