bp, these guys operate just up the road, and I'd guess if you emailed them and asked, they could help.

Here is a link that might be useful: maybe the guys to ask

This has little to do with your native grass experiments but involves my overwinter efforts to save a part of my lawn that is shaded and abused. I used a shade mix heavy on fescue and planted mid October. Mostly, I was trying to overseed but there was part of the ground where I'd completely killed the grass before moving a pile of dirt.

I'd thought that mid October was the very last moment to take advantage of the growing season but it turned out that the seed never germinated until late Winter.

This Spring, I removed a flower bed in nearly the same location and planted the grass seed mix. The 2 patches of ground are now essentially at the same stage of growth. They have been repeatedly mown and I walk on them when necessary and they seem to be holding up quite well.

You should know that the Spring-seeded ground has quite a few weeds unlike what was essentially dormant-sown in October and got a few weeks jump on the season. However, the weeds are having no chance to run to seed with the repeated mowing and I doubt if they'll put in a reappearance in 2008. If you are only planning to overseed this may not be an issue one way or the other.

Overseeding didn't work too well in my established KBG area. I'm thinking now that the ground is just too deficient in organic matter as well as being shaded, ridden with tree roots, and abused. Perhaps I can correct the organic matter deficiency by continuing to put down alfalfa pellets in the Fall (couldn't find soy meal). I may even reseed again - just wish that use would allow me to do this in September rather than a month later.

Your wild seed choices may be quite different, BPGreen. I admire your intentions to grow varieties more environmentally suitable to our part of the world.

digitS'

bp, my experience with the Streambank and Western Wheatgrass is that it takes a fair amount of seed for real coverage. That said, this stuff does spread well with each cutting.

Last fall I spread 10#s of Streambank and 5# of Western Wheatgrass on 3000 sq. ft. (so I'm gonna say 5-7# per 1000 sq. ft.). I still have a few bare spots and I've been fighting lots of thistle, spurge, and salsify in the bare areas. But the stuff is spreading through the yard and with very little water! Gracious, I've watered maybe four times since the wet spring we had. The Streambank is dormant now only because I'm not watering much, but the Western Wheatgrass has stayed consistently grey-green all summer. This stuff is so soft!

I tried seeding some Streambank this spring trying to take advantage of the natural moisture, but it was spotty in taking. I would say fall or dormant would be your best bets.

Were I to do it again, I would go with Western Wheatgrass simply because it doesn't grow near as fast as the Streambank. It seemed like I was cutting the lawn every 4-5 days this spring.

Thanks for all the help, everybody. I think I've been using seeding rates that were designed for pasture/reclamation seeding and that I'm not using nearly enough seed. I'm glad I checked before I bought my seed.

I've got the sheep fescue already, but haven't bought the streambank wheatgrass. I wasn't going to use western because I've had less success getting it to grow, but it does a better job at staying green with no water than streambank. It's so expensive, though that I think maybe I'll get some of each--streambank because it's more affordable and western because I like it better.

I need to do something with my 2 acres of grass, the recent years of high heat are taking a toll and the KBG/fescue mix is dying off in increasing spots. I asked the county extension agent last year to come out and look, and he said I wasn't watering enough. I looked at him askance, since I generally keep the place about as dry as a Mekong Delta rice paddy. I have my mowers up on the highest possible setting, and its still dying.

I'm busy looking over at my pond where I planted the Western Wheat Grass, which is thriving, and 100 yards away where it has spread, and all thats still bluegreen. I mow it once a year if it needs it or not. It gets its moisture via some elaborate and interconnected root system. I think I'll plant some seed in the dead spots in the main lawn.

I'll need to think of a name for it, a new planting technique, and pretend I know what I'm doing.

David--Did you buy your western wheatgrass seed from Southwest Seed? I looked at their website and can't find an order form or price list. The only price list I found was from a "Specials" link on their "Contact Us" page. But that looks like a daily specials list from October 2002.

I sent them a question a long time ago and never got a response. I'm trying again. I'll try calling in the morning.

bp, I get my seed from them, but its been several years now. They do a big business with reseeding after forest fires and along road construction.

Let me know if they don't respond, and I'll wander up there and ask. The office is about 1/4 mile up the road.

David--Thanks for the offer. I asked them for a price list and let them know the only one I found on their site was from 2002. They sent me a new price list and their western wheatgrass prices are the best I've seen (7.10 for Arriba and 7.49 fro Rosana). I asked for seeding rate information and which variety of western wheatgrass would do best here and also asked how to order. They don't seem to be set up for online ordering, so I'll probably have to call it in.

I was afraid the prices would be a lot higher because of the wildfires.

About 10 years ago, when I was setting up the vegetable garden in its final, permanent resting place, which was defined as enough slope to irrigate and not too many rocks, the soil was the usual 6" of sandy clay on top of more solid clay, on top of sandstone. So, being hip to the value of adding lots of organic matter, I went up to the seed mill and asked if, instead of hauling their waste stuff all the way to the dump, they could dump a few truck loads on top of future garden site, where I would turn them into compost, till them into the clay, and, theoretically, have a spiffy garden the next year.

The waste from the seed processing process is straw, mixed in with weed seeds, mixed in with what ever seed they are processing that is too small to stay in the sifters. Each truck is about 20 cubic yards, and I had 7 loads dumped, creating a mountain about 70 ft long by 10 ft wide by 8' high. I managed to compost some of this, but not all, since this was in January.

In March, I spread it out over the garden, and had a pile of stuff 3 feet high over the soil. This was too much for my little Mantis tiller, which caught on fire trying to till this stuff in. I know, I know. Even now, I have to wonder what I was thinkin'.

I had a friend with a plow come up and turn it all in, then disc it, then till it with his tractor. Still, I had a 2 ft high "raised bed" 75 ft long x 40 ft wide. And then, as it warmed up, all the seeds started to germinate.

Well, it was an interesting garden that summer. I actually did pretty well. A couple of exciting things, that yellow, orange fungus that develops in overly rich soil thats overly watered, often called 'dog vomit fungus'? I had one the size of a Buick. I had okra 7 ft tall.

the next year, it was great.

I've thought about using something like this from the cleaning machines at the dry pea and lentil plant a few miles from here, David. Might not want to, however.

About the closest I came was "stealing" a couple broken, rainsoaked bales of bluegrass straw way back when . . . Used it along with more bales of rain-damaged alfalfa as an ill-advised mulch for spuds.

Not only did I have a million voles feeding on everything including my spuds but the following year, I discovered that I'd turned my potato patch into a bluegrass lawn. It took some tiller work (nothing fancy since it didn't burst into flames ;o) to get rid of the grass.

Went back to the composted alfalfa alone after that experience.

digitS'

I heard back from Southwest seeds. Robby recommended a seeding rate of 3 to 5 lbs per 1000 sq ft, using the higher rate for broadcast seeding.

Here's my plan. Please let me know what you think of it.

I think I'll turn off the sprinklers next week (fireworks are allowed for 3 days after 7/24). Some of what is now dormant should then die by the end of summer. Next year, I'll water very little if at all, in order to give the natives a chance to dominate.

I'll be dormant seeding, in part because I think that improves the germination of the wheatgrasses.

Here's the mix I'm planning to use. I've got a total of 4k sq ft, but I'll skip the areas that get watered by my neighbor's over watering, so it's probably closer to 3.5k.

• 2 lbs Palestine strawberry clover (supposed to be good with alkaline soils, but doesn't seem very drought tolerant)

• 4 lbs sheep fescue (I'm not sure whether this is native or not)

• 10 lbs streambank wheatgrass

• 5 lbs western wheatgrass

I'm considering using 1 lb of blue grama for the hell strip (since it's in Utah, I think it's a heck strip or a goodness strip, but you know what I mean).

Seeds per pound of each of these (derived from a variety of sources):
Strawberry clover: 300k
Sheep fescue: 680k
Streambank wheatgrass: 152k
Western Wheatgrass: 118k
Blue Grama: 825k

By way of contrast, KBG has about 1500k seeds per lb.

A couple of thoughts,

The times I've tried reseeding / planting grass seed, I found that having a stand of existing, dead grass was beneficial to sort of 'protect' the environment right at the ground. Two experiences, one with cheat grass that had died off, and I just mowed it, picked up the dry seedheads and threw them out, and planted the KBG mix among the dry stalks. That worked very well.
Unless you're philosophically against the use of Roundup, it might be kind of an insurance policy to make sure that your new seed mix has a running start and won't have to compete with the roots of the existing KBG, which can stay dormant for some time, I believe. That was the 2nd experience, where I had tried to over-seed an area that had the brome grass and try to plant Western Wheat Grass. The first time, the brome grass won. Then I nuked it with roundup, an then the wheat grass won. I suppose the brome is back in there now, but it would be hard to tell.

Also, scratch the seed in a bit.

David--would Roundup be a good idea with dormant seeding? That seems a bit dangerous, since roundup will kill the existing lawn and there would be nothing until spring. Or are you thinking that I should consider RU and a more traditional fall planting?

My biggest problem with trying to seed in the fall is that I have an unpredictable schedule, so I might be out of town for a while right when I need to closely monitor the timing of watering.

I'm a bit confused. If I've correctly understood you, you'll let your lawn dry out and go dormant, some would possibly / hopefully die, and then spread your seed mixture in very late fall / early winter hoping it would germinate in the spring. I don't know how long Bluegrass can remain dormant without much moisture, but if you had fall rains, or snow melt, it would likely remain barely alive. Then it would compete with the new seeds, and the new seeds would lose.

You could spray the RU in mid-Oct, wait two weeks and spread the seed in early November, and rake it lightly in, leaving the dead stuff there to shelter it, and then start watering in April. But then, why not just kill the lawn, wait until april and seed over a dead lawn? My neighbor did that with his, and by June, it was hard to tell he'd replaced it.

I notice that around here the parks division does their grass planting in September. Irrigation water is shut off mid-Oct, and they usually have a good stand by then.

The time between spraying RU and replanting is pretty short, a couple weeks, and several garden shoppe folks have told me that a week will do.

Maybe that's what I should do, then. It would certainly give the best results in the long run.

bpgreen, is this your own mix of clover and seed? I'm interested in why you made these choices.

It's my own mix.

I made those choices because I kept changing my mind, sometimes after I had already bought some of the seed.

I've used some streambank wheatgrass and some western wheatgrass the past few years, but not nearly enough.

Last fall, I decided to add some clover since it's supposed to be very drought tolerant and adds nitrogen to the soil. I opted for strawberry clover because it's supposed to do better in alkaline soil. Unfortunately, based on a test strip I planted, it doesn't seem to be very drought tolerant.

This spring, somebody discussed sheep fescue and I thought that might work well as a low/no water grass.

At some point, somebody pointed me to a source of streambank wheatgrass that is about half the price I usually see it and is also in Salt Lake City, so I can save shipping if I pick some up next time I go down there.

I added the western wheatgrass back in after reading how weel it was doing for you and for jalirancher. The reason I don't use more of the western wheatgrass is that it's so expensive.

BTW, both the no more watering and the roundup ideas were vetoed by my wife, so I'll just be mowing short and overseeding.

I hope you can keep us informed as to how all this progresses, I will likely be doing something similar fairly soon as well.

We are starting to get some rain and cooler weather here, but still, my lawn continues to die off in small patches. This summer, I am seeing a new phenomenon where the tracks of the standard, walk-behind 4 hp push mower are leaving two white, dead strips.

We are, these last few summers, experiencing more and more days up in the mid-90's, and this may be too much for the particular soil / slope / grass combo I have.

I've popped in on a few of your other lawn threads and been paying attention to the different varieties you've all mentioned or tried. Thanks for posting this thread BP; it's been educating me as well!

My back lawn is maybe 3000+ square feet of KBG. I do not water it at all. It looks like it's dead now but last year I thought it was too and then it perked up with rains we got in August & September. But it looks really bad right now and the kids can't walk on it without shoes.

We've had a bit of rain and the part that gets partial shade from trees is trying to green up.

My plan is to seed a native grass into this lawn in September and put in a few more lacey type trees for partial shade (another decision as to which trees?).

Based on what everyone has said so far, seems like Western Wheatgrass may be the way for me to go since I am not watering at all?

Thanks and keep us posted!

Charlene

Western wheatgrass probably stays the greenest the longest. Maybe sheep fescue does, too, but I've seen conflicting reports on whether that's truly native. It's also a bunch grass, where the western and streambank wheatgrasses both spread by rhizomes.

One potential drawback to western wheatgrass (if I understand what I've read correctly) is that western wheatgrass stays green because it has really deep roots. If it does go dormant, it won't start to green up again until the water gets deep enough in the soil. Other grasses go dormant sooner, but pull out of dormancy faster as well.

I've ordered 5 lbs of western wheatgrass seed and 1 lb of blue grama from Southwest Seed and 10 lbs of streambank wheatgrass from Mountain Valley Seed. The blue grama is for a limited area where even native cool season grasses struggle.

I already had the sheep fescue and clover seed.

The more I think about it, the more it makes sense to kill the existing lawn first, even if I dormant seed. Most of the lawns around here go dormant in October, anyway, so if I kill mine, it would only look the same.

My remaining task is to convince my wife that this is the right approach.

Well, you offer to roto-till the existing lawn instead, or lay cardboard down to kill the existing grass, or offer to spray it, then paint it green, or.....

Good luck to you, bp! It takes a lot of courage to stand there with the Round Up and proceed to spray it on the existing lawn. I stood there for several minutes before I started spraying. ;)

I wish you good seeding and success!

PS: With the rain we've had my Streambank is beginning to green up again from it's dormancy. Tough stuff, but so soft to the touch.

I'm not using Roundup. I came close to doing it without saying anything to my wife, but I ended up chickening out, never mentioned it to my wife, and just decided to overseed.

I thought it was too late to plant the grama and too early for the western wheatgrass, but I planted a test patch with both last Saturday. There was some germination of both by Wednesday afternoon.

Based on those results, I'm beginning to think my prior attempts have failed for a couple of reasons.

In the past, I seeded at the rates I found online, not realizing those rates were pasture/forage/reclamation rates. This year, I'm using 10 times as many total seeds as I used last year.

I also waited until fall, when there was natural precipitation. The problem with that approach is that I waited long enough that the KBG also started to revive. This year, I'm planting before the KBG starts to revive.

Another big difference is that I was on the road during my prior attempts, but I'll be home for this one, so I'll be able to baby the grass more.

My goal is to stop watering altogether. If that means annual reseeding with western wheatgrass and sheep fescue for the next few years, I can deal with that.

I'm going to give a synopsis, and will probably repeat some of what has appeared earlier in the thread, but I thought it might be good to have a summary.

I was going to go with dormant seeding, but the contact at Southwest Seed said it would be a good idea to seed immediately. I also posted a question to the USU extension service and they recommended mid August to early September.

I tried a test patch with blue grama (I knew it would be ok in the heat) and western wheatgrass (I had concerns about this one). They both sprouted very quickly (less than 4 days), so I decided to do the entire lawn.

I cut the lawn progressively lower until I was at the lowest setting on the mower. Since the lawn hasn't been growing much anyway, I didn't have the issue with clippings I've had in prior years.

This evening, I raked the bare areas (I'm pretty sure they're dead and not just dormant) and started spreading the seed (5 lbs western wheatgrass, 10 streambank wheatgrass, 4 sheep fescue, 2 strawberry clover). The clover has nice round seeds that spilled quickly out of the hopper on the hand broadcaster, so the backyard didn't get any. I don't have very high hopes for it anyway, so it's no big deal. I switched to the push type broadcast spreader for the streambank wheatgrass (should have done so for the western, even though I had less of it).

After spreading all the seed, I manually ran each sprinkler zone for about 10 minutes. I had tested the sprinkler system at the beginning of July and it was fine. Three of the heads that should have been rotating were only watering in a straight line, which goes a long way toward explaining some of the brown spots. So I used the hose on the spots that stayed dry.

I then set the sprinkler to run for 8 minutes per station at 9 AM and 6 PM every day. I hate working on sprinkler heads in 90+ degree heat, but I think I'll replace the broken ones so I don't have to do so much manually. There are still spots that are out of sprinkler range due to decrease in water pressure so I'll still have some manual effort (but not half the front lawn).

I don't expect the 3.5 day germination I saw last week (although it would be nice). If I get germination in two weeks, that means the native grass will germinate before the fall rains start and they'll have almost 7 weeks before the average first frost day.

I would love it if I can get my lawn to a point where I never water it, but even if I get to the point where I water every other week, it would be a big plus.

Saw this piece on the news last night. This type grass might be a consideration for some of you in the next few seasons. Nice to see them actively working on alternative turfs!

I'm very happy with my wheatgrass, but glad to see more alternatives out there for people.

BP - thanks for keeping us updated. Do you know if it's okay to seed the native grasses in the spring or is it best to do so now? I'd rather wait. We have so many projects going on right now.

Jali- I saw that news piece on turf last night too. Very interesting.

I have to say that my KBG lawn that looked completely dead two weeks ago is now bright green after the rains and it greened up quickly just a few days after we got that first big rain.

So with absolutely no supplemental watering, really only July looked bad. That's one of the things they mentioned on that news show last night, is that KBG doesn't need as much water as people think. It does better in my lawn where it gets a little relief from filtered shade and we could definitely use some more trees on the west side so we may be adding some lacey type trees next year.

If I could get something in there like the Wheatgrass that would stay green even during July without water, we'll be set.

I think it's ok to seed in the spring, but you probably want to seed early spring if you do. I read somewhere that dormant seeding is supposed to help western wheatgrass, but I'm not sure how much of a difference it makes.

In a few spots, I've found some germination of seeds. But I'm not getting very excited yet, because I've seen maybe 5-10 new grass seedlings total. I'm hoping there are others, but I'm expecting that I'll need to keep watering for a few weeks more.

It has been a while since I gave an update, partly because there hasn't been much to report.

I saw some germination fairly quickly, especially on spots that were completely bare dirt (not just raked up from the stuff that dies from bad sprinkler heads). Then nothing for a long time.

I'm now seeing some germination at various places throughout the lawn, including in some areas where the KBG seems healthy (I can tell it's a new sprout if I look close enough). And I'm finally seeing some germination in the wide swath that died when the sprinkler head went bad. I'd like to see more in that area, but I'll take what I can get.

I think I've identified some sheep fescue germinating. It's that or crabgrass. It looks different from the single very thin almost round blade sent up by the wheatgrasses.

For anybody considering a similar lawn, my first bit of advice would be to do as I say and not as I did. Kill the existing lawn. Use a slit seeder or aerate the lawn. The native grasses have been much happier when they haven't had to compete with the KBG.

Well, if you can't beat them, join them. A race horse would enjoy that KBG, and you could dress up in bright yellow silk jodhpurs.

BP, that was supposed to be a joke, but sometimes the written word with out the big grin behind it can be misinterpreted.

What I wonder about is 'competition' between the various species you have. I notice here that under certain conditions, some of my specific grasses in the lawn do much better than others, ie a deep soaking brings out the brome, and the Western wheat grass does very well in the spring, the fescues in the summer, and so on. I wonder if you could manipulate that a bit.

I still have what ever is killing my lawn killing it, even with the cooler weather. I've never seen anything like it, even the tracks of a walk-behind mower leave two parallel dead strips.

David--I'm planning on taking advantage of the fact that the natives should do better under certain conditions than the KBG does. As I get enough natives in the lawn for them to make a difference, I'll water to favor the natives with the hope that they'll dominate, if not completely take over the lawn. I probably should have killed the lawn to ensure a better stand. On the bright side, with this approach, the areas that are closer to neighbors who water too much will probably end up with KBG, since the natives would probably drown in those areas.

I am a believer! Between planting the low water wheatgrass and putting nearly everything in the yard on drip and soaker hose, my water bills this summer are 32% less than they were last year. Oh, yeah, baby!

Jali--Part of my motivation for planting native grasses came from a change in the water billing where I live. We were given the option of signing up for unmetered water. The upfront cost was going to be $700 to bring it to the property line (and probably another 200-300 to get it to where it needed to connect to the irrigation system). Then there is a flat annual fee for the water (I think that would be $90 for my lawn). I was told it would pay for itself in 2-3 years. When I sat down with my water bills, I calculated that it would take more than 30 years (or much more than that if I instead took the money and stuck it in CDs or T Bills or something). So I opted not to get the secondary water. The following year, the impact of the new unmetered lawns hit the city and they jacked up the rates for the metered water. I have cut back my water use to the point that I am now paying about the same as I would if I had the unmetered water (even with my increased rates). I'm hoping the natives take over to the point that I'll start saving money compared with the unmetered water.

I seeded on 8/10, so it has been 4 weeks and a day.

I was traveling this week, but we got a lot of rain on Tuesday, so my wife turned off the sprinklers for a few days. I think the rain helped things along, because there has been quite a bit of germination in spots. I imagine the temperature drop (highs are finally out of the mid to upper 90s) probably helped as well.

I'm still disappointed in the germination in some areas, but I think there may be too much dead KBG in those areas keeping the seeds from being in contact with the soil.

I've got at least some germination throughout the lawn, so I think next year, I'll stop watering or start watering every other week, and the natives will take over.

I plan to further rough up the areas that had poor germination and drop some seed tomorrow (I kept a little in reserve). I'll also buy some in late winter and do some dormant seeding.

I'm also considering buying some "plug flats" in the spring. I'll plant a few seeds in each plug, get it to germinate and plant the plugs in holes I make with a turf hound. I figure that way I can get guaranteed growth in my "target" areas.

I reread most of the thread and was amused by David's comment on the KBG "racehorse" because on the lawn forum, everybody bemoans how slow KBG is to germinate. But compared with natives, it's pretty speedy.

Depending on how the natives are doing next fall, I may wait for it to cool off a bit and core aerate (didn't do that this time and I think it was a mistake) and overseed again, but with only the western wheatgrass (or maybe also the sheep fescue).

I was thinking about that 'plug' thing as well. It wouldn't be at all expensive to get a few 72 cell flats and start the seed off under ideal conditions, let the grass and roots get well established, and go stick them in. It would be a whole lot cheaper than buying the plugs, thats for sure, and the trays and flats could be reused several times.

I still don't know why bits and pieces of my lawn is dying. But with the plug approach, I can just pop these in where they need to go, and see if other species will work.

I hit upon the plug idea, first thinking of using the 72 cell flats, but when I was at a nursery, they had a different kind that looks more like a plug that would be close to the size of the round hole made by the turf hound, and it had 256 plugs in the flat. I figured that I could put just a couple of seeds in each one, since they'll spread once they're planted.