Only the two grasses, Greg? Sounds wonderful, are you watering the lawn?

Have you tried Echinopogon sp., hedgehog grass, or Entolasia sp, or Oplismenus sp., all near me, may not extend to Melbourne.

What prepartation did you do to the soil, did you kill all the existing lawn before you started?

Popi

Sprayed out the area with Rup/Garlon
Mulched with compost thickly
Planted tube stock for the Microlaena & divided some transplanted Themeda tussocks.
Eventually the compost will compact and become part of the soil structure (as it has done on my nature strip) and the grass will cover it over so you will never know it was there.

Although with my lawn I did not use much mulch because I am checking it every day and removing any weeds that appear.

Have only watered the newly planted cells in my lawn a once or twice, but other than that no. Although with the regular summer rain we have been getting the soil is still amply moist for the older grass tussocks.

My clients grass will not need watering at all since they were tube stock with much bigger root system and it rained heavily before the mulch was laid, so the soil is nicely wet under the mulch.

Sounds wonderful!

I am wondering about your selection of grasses Greg. Both would do well in a loam however in Epping I would have expected it to be clay and the summer climate is open and hot hence Microlaean stipoides may struggle a little. Bothriochloa macra is an alternative that would love clay, heat and a lack of water or don't you like a 'red' grass in winter? Austrodanthonia spp. are another alternative however a mix would be good as well.

I have actually seen Microlaena growing in black clay here in Epping and also in Sunbury, both in full shade and full sun. It does just fine. I have noticed that in shade it tends to grow longer and whispier while in full sun it seems to grow shorter and denser.

If I took seeds from plants growing in shady loamy areas then perhaps it might conceivably struggle up here in Epping.

"Sprayed out the area with Rup/Garlon"

For the uninitiated, what is Rup/Garlon.

Rup = Roundup
Good for weedy grasses but often does not work that well on broad leaf weeds. Do not need an Agricultural Chemical Users Permit to spray this.

Garlon
Is a broad leaf/woody weed specific herbicide. In general it does not effect grasses at all however I have discovered that it does knock Microlaena, although not kill it outright. Can also use MCPA or Kamba in place of Garlon and these are broad leaf specific herbicides though not that good for woody weeds. Need an Agricultural Chemical Users Permit to spray all of these.

if you do not have much foot traffic Native voilet should do nice. It has a edible flower.