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Your advise please

16 years ago

I cleared an additional 8,000 sq.ft. of my back yard. The existing lawn is 2 year old 419 bermuda. I would just sod the rest with the same, but I think it is too shady for brmuda. Some of the existing turf is suffering where there is slight shade.

What would you recommend, that will not look to odd adjacent to the bermuda. Since I have bear dirt, I was thinking of maybe seeding zoysia next spring. Isn't zoysia much more shade tolerant? The area will get about 6 hours of full sun.

[URL=http://img228.imageshack.us/my.php?image=yard002gp6.jpg][IMG]http://img228.imageshack.us/img228/8833/yard002gp6.th.jpg[/IMG][/URL]

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Comments (3)

wrager
Original Author
16 years ago
{{gwi:117857}}
Maybe I'll have better luck with photobucket.
quirkyquercus
16 years ago
That doesn't look very shady to me. Keep in mind in summer the sun will be more overhead than that.
If you like the look and behavior of warm season grasses and don't mind them being dormant for the majority of the year then you could use that if sod is in your budget. You could use a more (historically) climate-appropriate and beautiful cool season grass but unforuntately the site has been contaminated by bermuda which could spread into the more desirable grasses.
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dchall_san_antonio
16 years ago
Most zoysias require full sun.

I'm experimenting with an outrageously priced variety of a manila grass (zoysia) called Shadow Turf, from the Turffalo people in Lubbock, TX. It is supposed to be much more shade tolerant than other varieties. I thought I had a shady area, too, but the bermuda is growing like gangbusters in there. I'll be reporting back more about the Shadow Turf as winter approaches (probably late December for us). So far the Shadow Turf is as invasive as bermuda, but much easier to pull back out. Of course it have it planted in pure sand, so neither one is very hard to pull out. The Shadow Turf color is much greener than the common bermuda's blue-green.

It will be interesting to see which grass wins as they merge together. Right now I'm pulling the bermuda out of the Shadow Turf while it becomes established, but as it invades the bermuda, I'm letting that happen.

If you are thinking about Shadow Turf and worry about the cost, I got about 1 square foot of plugs for $90. I covered about 20 square feet with plugs. It sat seemingly dormant for 2 months and all of a sudden, exploded into full coverage in a 2 week period. I am at the point where I could remove plugs from my sod and transplant into other areas. Another way to do it would be to cover more like 100 square feet with the initial plugs. They WILL provide coverage once they reach the exploding stage of life. Still I'm used to paying more like a dollar per square foot for real sod (immediate coverage), so I had to swallow hard to spring loose for the cost of this turf. Good thing this is a hobby.

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