Bobbi,

I'd like to ask you some questions...

What is your watering practice like? How much and how often?

How high do you mow? Any mature shade trees?

I try to keep things simple.

Since your is recently built, the ground is probably messed up from the contruction (compaction, spills, etc), compost may be first thing to do although it is a backbreaking labor to do yourself. The good news is that it should be the only one time application ever. All you have to do is feed the soil microbes with organic fertilizer every few months and in turn they multiply and improve soil for you. I like to use soybean meal because of its value and the amount of protein (nitrogen). Easy to spread with rotary spreader. I get them at local feed store. Just don't tell them what it is for. They will give you funny look. I also like alfalfa pellets that you can use rotary spreader for it. Warning - when you water them down, it will look like thousands of small mammals have pooped on your lawn. So I like to let grass grow tall before it's time to mow then put down alfalfa pellets, water them in to soften them up over night then mow the next day.

In order to control weeds, you have to improve the soil, make it richer, making it harder for weeds to thrive. It is usually related to high amount of nitrate in the soil. To reduce the amount of nitrate level, you apply unsulfured molasses (dry or liquid) whenever you put down organic fertilizer. You probably will have to do that for a couple years. After that when the soil has improved, it may not be necessary anymore. You will have to hand pull weeds every once in a while to keep them from producing seeds. What else... mowing high helps a lot. I mow my lawn at 4 inches height during the summer where it's too thick let in sunlight to the ground for weed seed to germinate. You probably will have to mow at 3 inches during winter when the grass growth has slowed down to control weed growth as it is more mild over there in Houston. I do mow my mom's lawn during the winter believe it or not. I don't do that up here in Dallas area. Too cold for weeds to thrive during the winter and my lawn is too thick. See if you can find local worm farm that sells multiple species of worms to put under the mulches (beds and trees) and let them multiple and gradually spread out. Try and get European earthworm, red wriggler and others I don't recall.

Watering practice also makes a difference but Houston and Dallas are completely different. Houston tend to get good amount of rainfall most years so there will be times that you'd never have to water. My mom's lawn never gets watered. Just rainfall.

Anyway, weeds like it when they get frequent watering so try and not water so often. Every 7 to 21 days with deep watering should be sufficient. The easiest way to know is by looking at the grass. If they start to wilt, it's time to put down 1" of water.

You said that the contractor put down st augustine sod? My guess they used "Raleigh" variety because it's the cheapest. Not a big fan of it. Not much of drought tolerance, disease resistant, etc. The only good thing about it is SADV resistance. If you get brown patches, etc, rake them out and plug in 'Floratam' variety. Much more hardy. Drought tolerant is comparable to bermuda. SADV resistant as well.

Hope this helps.

Well, Lou, I have Raleigh that I sprigged in an area that was trenched to put electricity in an area that we wanted, and it has now spread to over a half acre with no additional waterings. Maybe it has to do with my soil, and the fact that I am low so that area holds moisture better than most. I firmly believe that the secret to great St. Augustine lawns is keeping them mowed.

Carrie,

You're lucky. It doesn't take much to kill Raleigh. As I recall, only 20% recovery after 2 months of no rain when it was tested for drought tolerance in San Antonio by A&M extension. Floratam had near 90% recovery. Wide coarse bladed zoysia varieties are in the 70% range. Bermuda had 99% recovery obviously. I don't know if it's true but supposedly Floratam is the only st Augustine you can grow in San Antonio. They are serious about cutting down watering.

I have always loved St. Augustine. Growing up we had bermuda while it ok better then bare ground and mud holes but with gardening bermuda is hard to keep out.
An elderly couple one street over from us had St. Augustine grass and I have wanted a home with St. Augustine all my adult life. Now that I have a home I've been working on the yard for 4 years going on five to get St. Augustine to cover the entire yard. I've been doing it the cheap slow way by taking plugs and putting them around the yard.
I have done it many different ways, digging holes placing plugs in and water every day or every other day, depends on how hot and dry it is.
I have also placed large squares of St. Augustine on bare areas in the late fall and covered it with leaves for protection and by spring time when I moved the leaves the grass had done really good.
Key to starting St. Augustine is good fertilizer and watering once it gets established it can go anywhere from two weeks before needing water.

Something happened to my lawn out front this summer and I've been babying it, it was fine then areas started dying. Fertilizer didn't help it. I'll have to wait till spring to see if it's going to make a come back or not.
If you can get some donkey poo that is one of the best fertilizers you can get, it's good for everything.

Don't worry about the weeds, once the St. Augustine takes off it will choke it out.

Lou, I too think your lawn is just gorgeous. I didn't see it in the earthworm e-mail I got from your post but saw it when I went to comment.

Thanks redthistle. I think having healthy population of earthworms help a lot to recycle nutrients and make them more available to the roots. Here's the info that I found regarding earthworms and nutrient recycling.

"Comparative analyses of casts and surrounding soil have shown that casts contain five times more nitrogen, seven times more phosphorus, 11 times more potassium, three times more exchangeable magnesium, and one-and-one-half times more calcium."

Jetman,

I have to wonder if your lawn got hit by SADV? My backyard got hit by SADV somehow. It used to be Palmetto variety and apparently susceptible to SADV so they slowly died off and Floratam took over rapidly and it's SADV resistant. Sapphire and Floratam are great "plugs" st augustine. They fill in much faster than any other varieties of st augustine. Not sure where you can find them though unless you come over to my house and get some runners during growing season. I once gave sapphire runners to my brother and I was shocked to see how fast they filled in large area that used to be bermuda grass. Delmar does not make great plugs. They spread like a snail. Probably the slowest spreading of all.