The Sioux Falls Fall Cleanup Checklist

In South Dakota the first hard freeze usually lands in mid-October, and the window between the last mow and frozen ground is short. This is the list our crews work through.

1. Get the leaves off the turf. Matted leaves smother grass and create snow mold under the snowpack. Two lighter passes beat one giant haul in November.

2. Clean the gutters after the trees are actually bare. Clogged gutters are the single most common cause of ice dams here.

3. Keep mowing until growth stops, then drop the final cut to about 2.5 inches. Long grass mats under snow; scalped grass has no insulation.

4. Aerate and overseed. Fall is the best seeding window in this climate — warm soil, cool air, less weed pressure.

5. Apply a late-season fertilizer. It feeds the roots through dormancy and is the reason some lawns green up two weeks earlier in April.

6. Cut back perennials and pull spent annuals so beds don't harbor disease over winter.

7. Blow out and shut off irrigation before the first freeze. A cracked backflow preventer is an expensive spring surprise.

8. Disconnect hoses and drain the exterior spigots.

9. Mark the driveway edges before snow flies. Stakes protect turf and sprinkler heads from the plow all winter.

Skipping the first two is what causes most of the damage we repair in the spring: dead patches from smothered turf, and water damage from gutters that overflowed and refroze.

We do full fall cleanups across Sioux Falls, Brandon, Harrisburg, Tea, Hartford, and Dell Rapids, and most customers roll it into a year-round plan so the same crew shows up for snow eight weeks later.