What I learned, most recently, surprised me. I guess I should have noticed it before, or at least tested it before, but if I ever did, well, that escapes me. So here is a bit of Files Wisdom, as regards to lawn patching, and lawn filling in. I had some truck ruts. Some longish ruts, right across the lawn, which basically got divided into thirds: one third got left, below ground level, by about two inches, even though I put an inch or two of fill into them. See 'A' in the sketch. Another third of the ruts ("B" in the sketch) got filled, and then some, and got mounded, about two inches. The last third ("C" in the sketch) got filled, and trimmed to exactly ground level. Dead level. Or, as Goldilocks would have noticed, "...Juusstt RIGHT!" The first two, the low and high, won't fill in. The dead level one is already almost entirely filled in. The sprouts on that one spread into the patch area, and then those sprouts seem to spread more yet. The lawn is entirely the same throughout. I renovated this year, and put down Milorganite twice, and that lawn just LOVES October. It's growing like crazy. All of it. Uniformly. Except the two patches, low and high, are coming in slowly, while the dead level patch is thriving. None of the truck ruts got seeded. My assumption was, hey, it's Kentucky Bluegrass, it will spread at this time of the year, leave it alone. So there's the observation, folks. If you need to make a patch, I'd surely recommend taking the time to get the height the same as the surrounding soil, and I mean exactly the same. There's something about a height difference that bluegrass doesn't seem to like to spread out in. But dead level, hey, you can't slow the stuff down. I'm wondering if this has some impact on the seeding of hillsides, and that a more shallow slope will fill in faster than a steeper slope. And maybe that's just next year's project. But for this year, with the patching, the observation surprised me, and I thought I'd share it with you.

I have one and agree with Resin on the end of the season browning. This year I'm going to try to keep it well watered to see if it does better. I don't like coddling plants, but I'm willing to try it for one year to see if it makes a difference. It sure is stunning early in the season though! Mine is almost the size of the one in the pic (after 5 years!) and just starting to make a statement in the spring. I can only imagine how gorgeous it will be as it gets bigger.

Hello again username 5 :-) My sympathies to you for the quack grass. I am sure you have heard the old saying....about changing what you can change and accepting what you can't and the wisdom to know the difference? Well...I agree with you that accepting quack grass is the wisdow to know the difference...lol. I am not sure I don't have it in the lawn, but if I do, I don't think it is everywhere. The one area I think it is in is adjacent to this vegetable area and I am not growing grass there anymore but installing a walkway with flat stones and creeping thymes between it. I am going to mulch that heavily before I do though and maybe let it sit there a whole season before I try laying stone. And I am going to plant the thyme very closely to get it to fill in fast. I am hoping that I may have killed 90% of it this year, in that area, because it has had cardboard and bark mulch covering it for three months and it has only rained twice in two months. I had another area of the yard, that I wanted to put a mulched sitting area in and I left clear plastic covering it for 2 years before we mulched it and put a sitting area there. We barely saw a weed for about 4 years after that, and just started getting them back this year, so we cardboard and bark mulched again and so far haven't had to weed this season. That area didn't have the quack grass in it though. I wanted to use the plastic technique for the quack grass but didn't want to injure the neighbor's trees. So my soil is close to ideal..hmmm...that is good to know. If I just had full sun and about an acre more of land..lol. This land used to be farmland in the 1940s. So I don't have to add lime to the soil for the veggies, right? I seem to do ok with the veggies. Last year was the worst due to horrible weather all season. Rain, cloudy, no breezes, humidity, heat..everything bad and nothing good. I got diseases on my tomatoes that I never got before. Thankfully this year was better. Even the dryness was ok for the tomatoes and peppers with supplemental watering. We also took out a 120 ft of overgrown shrubs along the lot line in the spring which really opened up the yard to air circulation. We planted new shrubs, but it will be awhile before they are that overcrowded. [g] I have one veggie bed near my back door that is on the other side of the yard. It is raised with cement blocks and instead of soil, I piled half finished compost and shredded leaves in it. I put in a couple of kale plants last spring and when it got hot, I pulled them except one that I wanted to leave to go to seed. After I collected the seed, I just left it there when I got busy. I had parsley in the bed too that I wanted to try to winter over. I put more shredded leaves around them and I was so happy to see that the parsley came back this year and has gone to seed. Love when it does that. The beneficial insects love the parsley flowers and I love the seed. The Kale plant, started growing again in the spring so I just left it, it flowered and went to seed again and I got busy again..lol .... and didn't pull it. I was so surprised to see it start growing again after it went to seed, and right now I have a kale plant producing very nice dark green leaves and it is filling up about a 4x4ft area of that bed. No covering either. We juice greens all year, so I am glad to have that plant with no work for it, right next to the back door. What is YMMV? [g] Okay well...you are right, nothing is written in stone. I may try using the lasagna bed technique and I can always add something else in another year if "disappearing" soil becomes a problem. Yes, I am growing all annual crops. How did you find the excavator that brought you in a truckload of soil? Sandy loam sounds great! I am not going to plant up that whole 35x35ft area with veggies. I am going to fill 4 raised beds that are 4x4ft. and I want to construct a structure to house compost and grow squashes and pumpkins etc up the structure. I will have a lot of just mulched area between the beds. WOW! Those silver maple roots are amazing~ ! I am SO sorry for all the trouble they have been to you. If we ever move, I am going to remember that. We had a neighbor 3 yards over just cut down every tree in his backyard. Why oh Why couldn't the people in the next yard do that?! LOL Oh, well, we aren't going to be moving anytime soon, so you are right, just have to make my peace with them. I thought maybe every fall, I should take a shovel and just push it into the ground around the perimeter of the beds to sever any small roots that are trying to get a foothold. I already found out first hand how they will go for anything raised. I have had them fill up a compost pile that I left too long, and have had them in my veggie beds over the years. What can you do...is right! Not very many people have the "perfect" growing environment. Everybody has something. Thanks so much for talking this all over with me. I am much more certain about what I need to do next year, and I can get started getting ready for next year, this fall. I rarely come to this forum. Especially this summer as I barely had a veggie garden. Had some plastic totes from Lowe's with 3 tomato plants, and a pepper plant. Two zuchinni and two eggplants in a bed in the ground...which btw was near that area that I mulched and was FULL of quack grass all season and nothing grew well. I didn't get one eggplant. The container plants grew much better. Two zuchinni were TOO much..lol. Next year, I have been told one is enough. ;-) Oh, btw, how much lawn do you have that has the quack grass in it? Have you tried that corn product that is supposed to suppress weeds? Adam

Glenda,,don't let them lie to you,,you can get a descent toilet seat for half that price.. But while we are discussing toilets..let me share a story.. There was an old couple that lived out in the country and they had an outhouse. One day at breakfast the wife says to hubby,,if you get nothing else done today..fix that damn outhouse. He went out and looked it over and found a door hinge loose, so he tightened it up, then he found a loosing siding board and nailed that tight. The next morning she is on him again,,"I told you to fix that damn outhouse!!!" He went back and looked again. Found one roofing shingle loose so he nailed that tight, then he looked all over but could find no more problems... The next morning the wife is livid,,,she says,"If you don't fix that outhouse today, I am out of here!!!" He says. "Wait a minute, I have looked at it three times and I fixed everything I could find that might be a problem, if you can show me the problem, I'll be glad to fix it." So off to the outhouse they went and she said its inside, so he went in and looked around, but found no problems,,,she says, "Look down there real close at the seat." He bent down and was looking at the seat, but still could not see any problem, but as he started to raise up his beard cought on a splinter and it yanked his hair,,he hollers "OOOOOOOOUCH" She says,,,"Hurts don't it,,,now fix that damn thing!!"