Home Hardware

Information may not be reliable

Welcome to Home Hardware
Home Hardware is Davenport’s Oldest and Best Hardware Store. We’ve accomplished this by working hard, giving you great customer service, obtaining extensive product knowledge, and stocking a large selection at a fair price. This is something we take pride in because we are a locally owned business.
We offer a lot of extra services that you won’t find everywhere else. We offer small engine repair, lamp repair, re-keying locks, cutting keys, window and screen repair, cutting and threading pipe, blade sharpening – including scissors, knives, saw blades, and much more! We have a large inventory of power equipment, electrical items, plumbing items, paint, tools, fasteners, cleaning supplies, and lawn/garden items. And if we don’t have what you need, we'll do our best to get it for you.
Check Out These New Products

In 2001 and 2002, Home Hardware was named one of Snapper’s Top Ten Dealers in North America. Home Hardware was named one of Arien’s Top Ten Snow Dealers of the Year in 2001. We have won numerous awards for sales volume, in addition to being named Stihl's Dealer of the Year 1998, and Seniors Citizens’ Employer of the Year. We were also nominated for the Better Business Bureau Integrity Award.
Get our Preferred Power Equipment Card when you purchase power equipment at Home Hardware. When you purchase power equipment from us, you’ll get it set up, test run, and delivered free anywhere in the Quad Cities. We will also take your old power equipment on a trade-in. The Preferred Power Equipment Card will give you priority service when you bring your equipment in for repair. We’ll move your equipment to the top of the repair list and give you a discount on parts and labor.
If you buy a lot of birdseed, don’t forget to pick up our Birdseed Card. Buy ten 50 lb. bags of any birdseed from Home Hardware and get the 11th bag free. Visit Home Hardware and experience all that a family-owned business has to offer.
Handy Tip of the Week: Lawn Care Made Easy

What does your lawn need and when do you do it? There are so many choices with lawn food and weed killers. What you need to do is take a good look at your lawn and determine what you want. Do you have a lot of weeds? Maybe some bare spots? Got a dog and have some brown spots?

Let's start with the four- or five-step lawn programs – you know the ones that are always advertised. Did you know there is more pollution from lawn chemicals then farms? I don't feel any lawns need all that lawn food or weed killer every year. You can do as much damage to a lawn from overuse of lawn food and weed killer as you can from not doing anything. So let's see what will work for you.

Most lawn fertilizers have three basic nutrients for your lawn. The first is nitrogen. Nitrogen makes grass grow greener and the blade of the grass grow faster. Then we have phosphorus. Phosphorus stimulates root and seeding development. Have you ever heard the saying, you can't have a good building without a good foundation? The roots are the foundation of a good lawn. The last is potassium. Potassium promotes tolerance to disease and drought. When you see numbers on the bag, such as 30-15-5, that tells you how much nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium you have, and you need to decide what your lawn needs most. You can take a sample of your lawn to your local Extension Service and they will test it and tell you what you need.

There are five basic chemical fertilizers. A starter fertilizer is used for new seeding or sod. Starter may have a 20-27-5 ratio – notice that the phosphorus is the highest number? This gives you that good foundation you need. Never use a weed killer or preventer when you are planting grass seed. Starter can be used any time of the year that you are planting grass seed or sod. The old timers say, you want to plant your seed on top of the last snowfall. Any time during the spring or fall is a good time to seed your lawn. You don't want to seed during hot dry periods. Most of the time, we have our wettest weather in spring and fall, and seeding needs plenty of water.

Then you have Step 1 – that is a lawn food with a crabgrass preventer. Notice preventer, not killer. Crabgrass dies at the end of the growing season. So what you need to do is put a preventer down, that won't let the seeds from the dying plants germinate. This can be put on too early or too late, and not work. If you had a lot of crabgrass – this is a vine, thin-bladed, and light-green grass – that you saw during the summer and fall, you want to use Step 1. Do not use this with grass seed. You'll want to watch the spring weather. Don't put it on too early – wait until you need mow the first time. Mow and put down Step 1. Step 1 needs water, so rain will activate it. If you need to plant grass seed, then you can use Step 1 for seeding. This is a lot higher-priced, and it will let the grass seed germinate and grow but not the crabgrass seed.

Step 2 is for late spring. Step 2 is a lawn food that will be high in nitrogen and have a broad-leaf weed killer with it. There are several things you need to remember to make this work. Do not put it down too early – make sure your dandelions and other weeds are up and growing. Just because you have a lot of weeds on the south side of the house doesn't mean it is time to put it down. When you see dandelions blooming on the north side, then it is time to put it down. You need to put it on early in the morning when the grass is wet with dew, or wet the grass first. This must stick to the leaves at least 24 to 48 hours. Do not put it down if it is going to rain.

Step 3 is a lawn food for late summer, when all the bugs are out. This will kill lawn-damaging insects. It also will feed the lawn. Make sure that with this application, you water it in good – you need at least two inches of water.

Step 4 is one of the most important. If you only want to feed the lawn, the fall application is the best. This gives your lawn the food it needs before it goes dormant, and will help it to green up faster in early spring.

Your lawn needs at least an inch of water each week to stay thick and green. If you can see footprints in the lawn, it needs water. If you don't care to use all the chemicals, you may try organic fertilizers.

If you have trees and have a hard time getting a good stand of grass, do not use chemical fertilizers. To get the best stand of grass under trees, use an organic lawn food like Milorganite or Sustan. Milorganite is sludge from the Milwaukee Sewage Treatment plant. Sustan is made from turkey droppings. Both of these are processed. Under your trees, put at least a spring and fall application. If you have a weed problem, spot spray with Weed B Gon. It may be necessary to prune some of the limbs out of the tree to get more light and air. Because the tree takes so much water and acts like an umbrella, you will need to water under the tree when it is dry.

When seeding, use a good quality seed. Read the label and see how much inert material is in it, and weed seed. You want little to none of either. Get a good blend of blue grass, fescue, and rye. Get something with a couple types of blue grass and fescue. Also, make sure the grass seed is sunny mix for sunny areas and shady mix for shade. We sell grass seed by the pound and it is mixed for this area. If you have brown spots from dogs and cats killing the grass, put down gypsum and sow with grass seed.

Like I said, you don't need a four- or five-step program. Just choose what steps you need the most and use them. Or go completely organic for feeding the lawn and then spot-spray for weeds. You will find that with the organic feeding, it will take a little longer to see the thick green lawn you want, but it will be easier to maintain and protect our environment. Do you need a lawn service to feed your lawn? You will be paying a lot for what you get. They have a tendency to try and add on a lot of stuff you don't need and it gets very expensive. If you can't do it yourself, ask a neighbor to do yours when they do theirs. If you do use a lawn service, make sure you know when you need to follow-up with water to activate it.

If you have any lawn questions, stop by Home Hardware and we will be glad to help you out. We appreciate your business and will not sell you items that you don't need.
More handy tips