OK I am going to jump in here and give you some tough medicine just like my Doctor gave me 20 years ago when he said: "Make a choice to either live or die, makes me no difference I get paid the same either way" OK you did about everything you could to kill it from neglect to start with. You did not water or fertilize it. Fortunately Bermuda is some tough stuff and will survive most anything you can throw at it. Assuming it is still alive let's do this. 1. At this point I do not recommend any pre or post-emergence herbicide at this time because your grass has not established itself and is weak from neglect. Normally during the winter if it goes fully dormant (absolutely no green sprigs), you can spray anything green with Round Up to control established cool season weeds. If you just have to do something wait about 1-month and use a product called AMAZE made Greenlight sold in ACE Hardware and some Box Stores. If not there it can be ordered on line. Keep the weeds mowed down this winter. Being in SA you will get a good amount of weed growth. Keep them mowed down before they can go to SEED STAGE and compound your problem. 3. Forget over seeding. You have Bermuda sod, and there is no seed that you can buy to match it. Besides you cannot seed Bermuda until around May or June in your area. 4. Forget top dressing with anything for now. If you top-dress now over dormant Bermuda you will kill it. It has to be actively growing vigorously in the heat of summer. You can revisit this in late June or July if needed. 5. This late winter or early spring when you are certain there will be no more chance of frost, get the mower out, lower it as far as it can go, and scalp the lawn down. I DO NOT MEAN down to dirt, just really low without digging in to the dirt. Then rake up the debris. 6. About two weeks after you scalp if your timing was correct you should start seeing sprigs of green Bermuda indicating it is coming out of dormancy. When you see that happen apply a balanced fertilizer of 15-5-10 or 20-5-10. You can get it in TX at any HD under the brand name of LESCO. Apply at the recommended rate or either 6.5 lbs/Kft^2 for the 15-5-10 product or 5lbs for the 20-5-10 product. Immediately water it in at 1 inch of water. 7. OBTAIN the BERMUDA BIBLE, read it and follow it to the letter. It will tell you how to properly mow, water, and feed your Bermuda grass. This is why your grass is in such poor shape. Failure to follow a maintenance routine will result in a failed lawn no matter what type of grass you have. 99% of having a healthy and attractive lawn is proper mowing, watering, and feeding the grass. FYI Bermuda is a nitrogen hog and requires fertilizer about every 30 to 45 days during the growing season. It also needs mowing twice a week. It is a labor of love to keep attractive and relatively weed free. Don't worry about weeds right now. You need to get the grass healthy again, then worry about weeds.

I am a plumeria grower and I live in Alice. I purchased 1 each of several colors a number of years ago and then did a swap for 2 unknowns; I've been hooked ever since. When I was on Kauai a few years ago I collected quite a few sticks from around the island and brought them home with me. I've also gotten quite a few cuttings from a lady on O'Ahu who has a Yahoo group. She collects cuttings from around the island then sends them to group members who pay the S&H costs. I also got several plants from Tally today at the SA plant swap. I have none that are named varieties, or at least I don't know that I do. I'm not really worried about names as much as I am about beauty and variety. At present I have 16 semi-grown plumies (4-6' tall), the 3 plants I got today and 5 large rooted cuttings. Not a huge collection, but I'm just getting started. ;-)

Ive been fighting thrips on my blueberry bushes for 3 years now in South Houston. They reck shop on new growth late in the fall season and thats the growth that produces your flower buds for spring fruit. Ive been using spinosad for 3 years and try not to spray untill after harvest. They seem to peek in Aug and Sept in my area. Ive done alittle research on them and kaolin clay (surround) is suppost to be pretty effective on thrips plus it helps plants deal with heat which is a bonus in my area. I ordered some surround this spring and will start using it after harvest this year. Hopefully I wont have to spray spinosad anymore. I did notice after spraying spinosad it would knock them back for a couple weeks then seemed like they came back even stronger. It does kill beneficials as well. Dont believe every thing you read on those labels. The lady bugs and lace wings were no where to be found after spraying for months! Dont use it unless you have too. I believe it does more harm than good. A healthy population of lace wings and lady bugs I think can possibably keep there numbers in check but Im afraid they are here to stay. The only plants I dont see alot of damage on here from thrips are rabbiteye blueberries, okra and tomatoes. They do hit the rabbiteyes but not very much at all. Bellpepper, black berry, strawberry, Southern High Bush Blueberry all get attacked in a bad way.

RobinKate, I absolutely agree, the best use for those sweet pickles of Linda Lou's is sliced on a fish sandwich. Yum. I made a couple of batches of them this year, I love them. Lucky Deanna. The blue plate is perfectly lovely, I like that seafoam blue color really well. I supppose you COULD put the pickles in there, but I wouldn't. I'd just eat 'em out of the jar and save the pretty dish for something else. LOl Annie