You might try this: fertilize it, regularly (monthly? every-other-monthly?), but at half-rate, with Milorganite, or a local equivalent sewage-sludge fertilizer. That stuff won't burn your lawn in the heat.

but you'll get better performance, and better color, out of the bluegrass.

If you're reluctant to do the whole thing, go buy one bag of Milorganite. then pick a section, about six feet long, in that narrow section you showed us, and mark it out: fertilize just that section, with a whirley hand held spreader, regularly. See how it compares next year.

Good luck with it, and nice work!

Exciting results, QQ. We've gotten more rain here in Knoxville than you have in N. GA, so I bet KBG would be doing pretty well here too. This is a very educational experiment. It makes me wonder how much the Bermuda hurt/helped the KBG survive. To clarify, I wonder how the KBG would be doing if it had been seeded on bare soil or dead turf (like in a renovation) instead of into living Bermuda. In the area above that you killed with roundup, do you plan to seed KBG directly in there? That may help answer the question by this time next year.

Thanks for your work!

That's a good idea philes. I would like to use organics exclusively on my lawn but I wasn't reluctant to fertilize it, I just had a lot going on in the spring.

I have wondered the same thing Chisey. The only noticeable loss of KBG was where the Bermuda was taking over so I don't know but where the Poa annua was the KBG has started filling in the bare spot. The way I see it is if there's a month and a half or two months where bermuda outcompetes, then whooptydoo, just reseed that area and you'll be back where you started from.

And I'm not so sure having a lot of water would be all that fortunate. With already high humidity + a lot of rainfall could mean fungal diseases.

quirkyquercus,

Great job and awesome report. Keep us posted as the fall progresses. My guess is that your KBG will do really well as he season cools.

The other thing to consider is perhaps the KBG will recover the ground it lost to bermuda once the Bermuda goes dormant. My guess is that your KBG won't go dormant for long down in Georgia, making it likely that it could overtake the Bermuda during that period.

It will be interesting to see. You might just end up going back and forth between the two, depending on the season.

I realized this afternoon, I could probably use Image or other selective herbacide that kills Poa spp. but not bermuda. Then I could really have the best of both worlds but I might lose a month or two trying to get both back in gear. I guess that might be a backup plan.

Thank you for doing this and for sharing your results. I decided to only go with about 10% Midnight in my overseeding, but I'm still excited about that little bit.

Wow - that looks great! Way better than I would have ever expected after summer.

Terrific, Quirky!

Thanks for all the compliments.

I just came back from Lowes and guess what!
They have a few bags of Pennington Kentucky Bluegrass mix.
And I'm not talking durablue or thermalblue or mostly fescue... This was ALL KBG. No fescue, 0% weeds and 1.98 inert matter. I don't remember the varieties but there were 3 varieties. 15 lb bags for $34.95 Lowes in Buford on the end cap shelf above the seed blankets. Maybe Pennington is reading this?

Ok - I've been away from gardenweb for about a year and a half and now I'm so glad that I checked back in. (I guess that's what having two kids in 3 years will do to ya).

- QQ -
I moved out here to E. TN 3 1/2 years ago from the dallas area and have been at my wits end with having a nice lawn. Out there - I used RU to kill all of my weeds/bermuda and then plugged some st. aug. and watered and it became the envy of everyone on my block but it's not so easy up here.

My turf has been nicer than most of my neighbors (i've got an ugly K31 fescue) I just mow it high and feed it a balanced 10-10-10 in the spring but bermuda is beginning to creep in from the neighbors and I'm trying to figure out what to do ... this post has given me something to try this fall.

I'm curious about a couple of things - you stated that you have a mix of midnight, midnight II and bedazzled. Where did you purchase those seeds? You also mentioned the pennington's KBG mix - I believe my local Lowe's has that but was unable to tell the varieties of KBG inside the bag from their website - do you know what KBG seeds are in that mix?

Now a question for everybody -
Since I'm not wanting to RU my whole entire lawn to try this - I'm thinking that I can plug aerate it and possible lay down some top dressing and then overseed with the KBG?

What do you guys think?

gannimal07...
Welcome Back and also welcome to the transition zone where having a decent lawn is a lot of work.

I got the Midnight seeds last year from Summit Seed. I thought I was ordering early enough this year (about a month and a half ago) and they didn't have any. I ordered some other stuff and the bulk of my seed came from Pawnee Butte where I tried to order Midnight but instead they sent me Midnight Star by mistake. By the time I realized what had happened, they didn't have any midnight. So I've actually been unable to find midnight this year. I do have some left over from last year that I might use and I have a couple lbs of Bedazzled. For the backyard, I have 6% bluegrass with midnight and boutique and that was already blended in when I got it.

The Pennington mix should say on the back of the bag on the label. The contents vary from place to place, store to store and bag to bag however from what I recollect it looked like the same KBG they put in their other blends. Merit, Baron, Cadet... not really sure but I know I remember seeing at least one of those names on the label.

As for adding the KBG, I would quickly clear out a test section with no fescue and plant nothing but KBG there and see how it does after a year. Bluegrass seed is expensive and you probably wouldn't want to mix it in with k31 since if it does do well, won't look so great anyway. Then after a year if you're pleased with how it's done, then you might want to consider replacing the k31 with a nicer blend.

Quirkyquercus,

You can still get Midnight II from Rose Agriseed. (The owners are the folks who ran turf-seed.com until they sold it to Scotts.)

As part of the sale, Rose Agriseed can still sell seed to retail customers.

The seed delivered to my house even came in the old Turf-seed bag.

You can reach them here:

The phone number is 503-651-2130.

Thanks QQ - I appreciate your input and your kind welcome.

When you say quickly clear out a test section do you mean to use RU to kill the K31, mow it close, and clear out debris for an october seeding of KBG? That's something that I may try but I'm more concerned with the bermuda that is coming in from all directions.

Right now - a majority of my lawn is the K31 but it's quickly losing out to the bermuda. I'm thinking of testing the KBG where there is bermuda ... not K31. Killing the K31 is no problem. I could cut it short a few times, RU once, or let bermuda run it's course.

I know that the K31 and KBG won't look good together but maybe a tttf and KBG would be ok ... I guess what intrigued me about your experience is that I believe that I read that you just threw KBG seed into existing bermuda? Is that right?

I've got several large patches of only bermuda where I could test that as well as killing off a section and seeing how the KBG does totally by itself.

So - for this little experiment - would it be ok if I bought the Lowe's Pennington KBG mixture or should I try to get the midnight? What else do I need besides Round Up and Starter Fertilizer?

Thanks for your help - If I'm hijacking the thread then let me know and I'll start a new one ... Thanks!

We wish you well, considering ordinary KBG doesn't even do well as far south as Kentucky. Perhaps you can prove many wrong, but one season won't do it. Let us see what it looks like next Sept.

For those of you like-minded, you ought to at least consider the new (genetically-altered) KBG's by Scotts, promising great things like drought tolerance, heat tolerance,low maintenance, shade tolerance, and adaptability farther southward, namely Thermal Blue,Thermal Blue Blaze, and Dura Blue, just coming to market. I was able to buy a blend of the three from an area sod farm.

Of course, there's always marketing hype, so I'm hoping there are no nasty surprises like there have been many times before. But it seems real progress has been made, even if only by trial and error.

Here is a link that might be useful: Heat-tolerant BG, even to zone 8

I posted some links to trials and customer reviews and comments on the thermal blue in GA and AL. Maybe doing a search will turn it up.

The reason I used Midnight was because it was supposed to be more heat tolerant. I don't know about what's in the pennington mix. Last summer and prior summers there were only about 3 days each summer that were 90 degrees or higher and compared to typical summer weather in many northern states I thought I had a good chance. This summer on the other hand was brutal. Practically every day has been 90+ and it's only rained a handful of times.

I did just toss the seed by hand into live bermuda last October and it overtook the bermuda during the cool months but at the edge it was overtaken by the bermuda very rapidly beginning in July. So this will be a perennial problem for you unless you can figure out some way to keep the neighboring bermuda from encroaching. There is also supposedly turflon ester but I don't know how practical it would be to apply that. Some say to apply once a month and if I wanted to apply crap to the lawn once a month, I wouldn't have had any problem with the bermuda to begin with.

To clarify, I meant clear out a similar sized test section to what I had (+/-200sf) and plant the bluegrass there and see what happens with it. Or if you're in the mood to start from scratch, 86 everything including the bermuda and reseed with a fescue/bluegrass blend.

I really, really, really can't envision a total failure growing a bluegrass lawn in Eastern TN. Even my state's agricultural extentions say it can be used in the northern part of GA. I would suggest using midnight since it has set the standard.

You might want to pay a visit to NC's turf site and use the turf selector function to show you potential grasses. I know you're in TN, but there are places in NC with a similar climate. Just click on the county closest to you. It usually turns up a tall fescue and kbg mix. I would be the most comfortable with the tttf/kbg mix just in case in the years to follow, problems result.

By the way I think the fescue and bluegrass can prove to also be very high maintenance but it's in different areas. Will need costly overseeding each year and will need irrigation in the summer and will need frequent mowing in the spring/fall. Then again, it's a lawn that looks like a lawn all year round. At least for me. That is more reasonable to me than Bermuda.

Oh and I forgot to add that there are a lot of tall fescues that frankly... look a lot like KBG! So having a monostand of it really doesn't make that much sense to me in my situation. Tttf is cheaper, and it germinates faster and easier to get. On the other hand the bluegrass fills in bare spots to some extent. What originally drew me in to using it was that it can be mowed very short, unlike fescue and people kept telling me it won't survive here so naturally I wanted it even more.

Just came back from Lowes the Pennington mix goes something like this
39% Blue Bonnet
39% Park
19% Baron
The rest is other

Thanks alot - I really appreciate all of your help. I saw the pennington seed at a lowe's when my wife and I were out about 20 miles from our home - BUT - they didn't have it at my local Lowe's when I went by yesterday morning. But, due to cost, I think I am going to try something a little different ... I'm going to try a tttf/kbg mix (mainly tttf). I bought a 3 lb bag of the rebel extend and am going to try it for my little experiment.

I've started clearing out a spot w/ RU already and plan to sow just before we get a few rainy days here in the next few weeks. I'm going to try sowing some on the part that I prepare and some straight into bermuda (and some right into where the K31 is just so I can see what it looks like together).

I'm planning on turning over the soil just a little in the bed that I'm preparing and throwing down some starter fertilizer with it as well.

Thanks alot for your help - I sure hope I didn't hijack the thread - I'll try to not be lazy and take pics of the whole ordeal if anybody's interested ....

thanks again!!!

No apologies necessary. I'm glad if I can help.
I think you made a good decision. You can always add more bluegrass later on.

Quirky, you're inspiring me to get rid of my Bermuda. Until now I thought the only economical replacement would be centipede from seed and I don't like centipede. Zoysia wouldn't be bad, but the sod is a little out of my budget. I would think your climate and mine in Coastal NC would be similar. Maybe Bluegrass would work here???

Judging from what Bill and others have said about Coastal NC, I think you got more humidity and a broad extreme of temps... warmer in the summer and possibly cooler in the winter. Despite your zone 8 status. BUT, I went to the NCSU turffiles site and clicked on "home lawn/high profile" for Onslow county (just taking a guess) and it shows fescue/kbg mix as being an option for that county. There's only one way to find out and that's to experiment.

I don't dislike Centipede. I haven't found it to be cheaper either. In fact this local Nursery sells the Centipede sod for more than Bermuda. Click here
I think the higher cost is due to there being a shortage.
There's nothing to be ashamed of with centipede. Its requirements are few. To tell you the truth, if it was evergreen, it would be my first choice for the backyard. So if I'm not successful with the fescue/kbg back there I might be using that instead.
As for zoysia... still another very high maintenance grass. It may be better at choking out weeds and have a slightly longer growing season. The only zoysia I like is Emerald though.

By the way I wonder if my elevation has anything to do with my results... I'm at about 1200'

Yep, your elevation could help. You're at 1200 ft and I'm at 12 (literally). I am in Brunswick Co (between Myrtle Beach, SC and Wilmington, NC. I live on a barrier island and our temps are much milder than just 15 miles inland. In the summer we're about 5-10 degrees cooler and in the winter about 5-10 degrees warmer than the surrounding areas.

I think I may experiment with some KBG and maybe some TTTF.

I'm in zone 7 (central NC) summers here are mild for the most part, but in the past few years there have been somewhat hot during the month of July and August. Our average high during the month of July (the hottest month in NC) is 89F, and our average low is 69F. Our yearly rainfall is 45 plus inches, with July being the wettest.. Our soils are mostly heavy clay. We get our first frost by mid October, and a freeze before Halloween.

I currently have 100% Kentucky bluegrass in my front lawn, and a blend/mix of KB, Red Fescue, TT Fescue, Perennial Ryegrass in my backyard - all growing happily in semi shade conditions. The blends I use are the following:

Galaxy KB with is comprised of: blackstone, Midnight, Serene, Unique, and Midnight II. The latest blend for Galaxy KB is Midnight II, Moonlight, and Prosperity. They produce a medium to fine leaf texture, and a very dark green color under high maintenance (a lot of fertilizer) I'm pleased with results thus far. The lawn went semi dormant for 3 weeks in August because it did not rain for 2 strait weeks. But as soon as moisture arrived, it turned green right away. The dark green color that Kentucky Bluegrass are known for did not return until October despite the cooler temperatures, fertilizer, and heavy rains.

I believe you can successfully grow KB in Northern Georgia, it just needs a little more maintenance, water, and care than Tall Fescue during high heat.

I have plenty of pictures if anyone wants to see, just email me at xlemos@msn.com

BTW, I'm in Cary, NC. Just west of Raleigh, and about 400 feet above sea level.

I'm also doing an experiment with Perennial Ryegrass. I seeded an area of about 1000 sf with Allaire II PR. I will know next summer if it survived. So far is doing awesome. The color is not as dark green as Fescue or Bluegrass, other variaties of PR are just as dark as Bluegrass.

Can someone else experiment with Perennial Ryegrass as well? Specially those in the mid section of the Southern US.

Heelsfan, I'd be very surprised if you have success with KBG and fescue on Oak Island.

Where exactly is Oak Island? Any updates on that Bluegrass in GA?

Auteck, I'm experimenting with Perrennial rye now. I'm awaiting germination on a little behind the house to see how it looks. There is also someone else in the DC area growing it. I actually have some annual rye that I planted mid winter that is still alive and growing.

If you haven't been following my other posts or updates on 'my page'
the bottom line is the best looking grass I have right now is the Bluegrass that's now on it's second year. The section in shade did get rusty in Nov or Dec but it cleared up after a couple apps of immunox. The fescue & bluegrass mix in backyard which I planted in the fall and overseeded in the spring due to rabbit damage is dormant in spots due to not having any rain and putting down too much fertilizer. The areas that have turned brown are where the sprinklers don't reach too good. Some of it has come back after running the sprinklers for much longer.

The second best looking grass I have right now is the creeping red fescue. That stuff is beautiful. Shows no signs of stress at all.

The bentgrass started to look really rough on the side closest to the street but it appears to be coming back too. This would be consistent timing with quality ratings that show a big dip in may and june.

I'm not ready to call anything a failure. Especially since I'm still waiting on the bermuda to completely green up.

Wow, I can't believe this thread found its way back to the top.

Anyway, I have tried my experiment. Last October I seeded about 200 sq ft with a Pennington Tall Fescue/KBG mix from Lowes. It came up fairly nice and looked good during the mild winter.

Anyway, it is already starting to brown up. I have it on irrigation, but I believe the soil is just too sandy to keep the grass alive under normal watering conditions. I would probably have to water it at least twice daily to keep it alive. Plus, my Bermuda is starting to creep into it. The hright of the mix hasn't affected the Bermuda at all. It's creeping with the growth almost visable daily. My guess is it is loving all of the water I'm dumping on the mix.

Loving this, Quirky. Any updates for us?

Heelsfan, give the sandy soil compost or peat moss. That'll help.

auteck,

Oak Island is a small barrier island near Southport NC. I'm not sure heelsfan was referring to Oak Island. I was just guessing.

"Loving this, Quirky. Any updates for us?"

I just posted one around 3:04pm today. Look back a couple of replies.

Heelsfan, that kind of stuff wasn't happening here until August last year. Sandy soil is tough. I know compacted clay can be a real p.i.t.a. but I wouldn't trade it for sandy soil.
Anyway it looks like the cool season isn't a long enough season for you to make it worthwhile. Did you pass the break even point?

I'm working part time on a Golf Course, and the greens there are bentgrass grown on full "turf sand" soil with "some" peatmoss". They are irrigated every morning, and during the summer months, they are irrigated in the afternoon to cool the turf from the intense heat.

The sandy soils do not hold water very well, the clay soils hold water very well, but when they get dry, they do NOT absorb water right away. It's almost like a clay pot...

I believe the soil is the key to a healthy lawn, that is able to hold moisture and provide nutrients to the lawn.

Stray clay in the middle of the summer will NOT hold water well - specially after a drought.

Can we have some pictures of the Perennial Ryegrass and some updated pictures of the Kentucky Bluegrass in GA?

Thanks, guys. Awesome thread...

tarheel, that's the one.

auteck, sorry. I meant to put that inmy previous post.

Updated pictures, please.

Auteck, I've been warned against afternoon "watering" as opposed to light "misting". Which one are you doing?
I will try to get some updated pictures for you.

heelsfan,
I just came back from columbia, SC which is only 4 hours drive from here and what a difference in climate.
It has rained here twice in the last 2 months yet yesterday in SC I got thunderstormed on 8 times in one day. It was like a rain forest. That is the kind of humid coastal plain weather that puts that tropical swamp grasses into high gear and we haven't had that here and we don't normally even get that kind of weather until August. If you're having or have had that kind of hot humid weather with temps in the mid 90's and above then that really isn't what I'm having to contend with.
I did see some tall fescue that actually looked like it was in excellent shape though.

Afternoon watering is only ok to cool the turf on a hot summer day, our regular watering occurs every morning around 6 am during the summer.

The bent gets cut every day during the growing season, even if is wet from irrigation.

Golf courses do things very different from homeowners - I'm learning...

Sorry for bringing back an old post but, any word on how the grass is doing after a few years of drought? I am planning on planting here in the next few months and if the KBG midnight is still doing ok I plan on throwing some down. By the way, where is a good place to get ahold of some midnight in northeast Atlanta (Winder) Ga.? Thanks for the help as I am tired of having an acre of clay. One place I talked to said they quit selling it in the fall because it wasnt coming up and they had to take care of the warranty.