Thanks for the response. I can see bare patches of dirt so I think it was seed. The home is 10 years old.

Should I apply roundup to kill everything and start fresh?

The lawn gets sun for 3-4 hours at least. Some of it is in shade because of the trees around.

I am thinking the following steps for seeding-

Kill everything with roundup.

Wait 2 weeks, then mow to lowest setting.

Rake up all the debris.

Aerate the soil with rental from homedepot.

Spread the bermda seed, and add top soil.

Will this work?

I know bermuda goes dormant in winter, what happens to St. Augustine?

bump

Is the Bermuda dead or just weedy?. If weedy you can save it. If it is hybrid last thing you want to do is kill it and replace with seeded common variety.

SA will not go completely dormant in the valley, but you had better be a high income earner to keep it alive as it is going to need a lot and I mean a lot of water unless you live west in the Gilbert area where there is actual soil. Additional the high salt content will do SA in eventually.

If you are going to seed, it is too early, but I suggest you first try to save what you have. Having said all that, unless you have irrigation and can afford to use it frequently, no grass is going to make it through summer.

One alternative is Buiffalo grass if there is no shade whatsoever. For Bermuda the two best hybrids for the area are Celebration and 419. The only seeded variety that is known to work in the valley is Midiron. As for SA only Palmetto.

Texas Weed,

Thanks for the response. Please see my responses.

Is the Bermuda dead or just weedy?

I am not sure. There are two lawn areas - 200sft and 700sft

200sft - Totally filled with Poa Annua. I mowed to lowest setting and sprayed Spectracide. Now the lawn looks all dry with thatch. I am not sure if it is the Poa Annua, or bermuda. I will post a pic tomorrow morning. This lawn gets full sun.

700sft - Filled with creeping charlie, and other weeds. There is patches of Bermuda grass. I sprayed with spectracide in this patch too. There are also patches where bare dirt is visible. This lawn gets a lot of shade with trees.

I decided to reseed only because I felt that starting fresh will be cost effective, efficient, and quick way to get a dense, green lawn, than go with multiple weed spray rounds, and wait for the existing grass to fill.

Can you also comment on the lawn renovation steps I listed in a post above?

Thanks a lot.

This is the 200sft lawn.

Ignore my seed suggestions and listen to TW.

The 700 sqft lawn has too much shade for bermuda. You might send a soil test to Logan Labs and post it back here to see what morph has to say about the soil chemistry. TW's comment on salt has me concerned. I've seen St Aug growing from the sand dunes out into the sea, so I'm not too concerned about that, but I'm wondering what salt there is in PHO.

You would be better off waiting for the old grass to revive than to seed with new. Established roots work better and faster than new roots. As I usually mention to people who are impatient with their bermuda coming out of dormancy...give it time and you'll be laughing that you ever suspected there was a problem. Now with the shade, you do have a problem.

Your steps need comment:

Kill everything with roundup. This is fine.

Wait 2 weeks, then mow to lowest setting. Oops! Don't wait 2 weeks. Water the area daily to try and sprout all the weed seeds you can. Then spray with RU again a week later.

Rake up all the debris. This is good

Aerate the soil with rental from homedepot. No need for this step. If you have hard soil, then use shampoo on it.

Spread the bermda seed, and add top soil. YIKES! No. Scatter the seed and roll it down with a rented water fillable roller. For really small areas, just walk on all the seed to ensure good seed-to-soil contact. Don't add topsoil unless you are trying to raise a low spot on the yard. Adding topsoil WILL change your drainage. There's another recent post on this forum where the guy has a broken house from water backing up into his garage and then freezing between the bricks. His pictures indicate too much top dressing caused the water to not drain into the yard but instead back up to the buildings.

dchall,

Thank you.

In the 200sqft lawn how do I determine if the Bermuda is going to come up again? Shouldn't it be a little green by now if it is going to come up. This was filled with Poa Annua which looks so similar to grass.

How can I determine if the Bermuda is going to come back? How can I make sure that the Poa does not come up again with seeds?

In the 700sqft lawn, there by Bermuda before, but I am guessing it was laid when the trees were smaller with no shade. So SA is my only option there, right. I think I can get started with roundup for this lawn.

Btw, both the lawns have sprinkler irrigation.

Well up here in Prescott Bermuda is already greening up, and Phoenix should be a couple of weeks ahead of us. So if you are not seeing Bermuda by now, then it is likely dead. Or if you have not irrigated, it might just need a good soaking to wake it up.

Here is the problem and you are going to have to make some difficult decisions. What I am not sure of is how much shade are we talking about in the back yard? Very important question which dictates what you can do with the back.

Here is the problem. Shade and Bermuda are do not play well together. Bermuda needs at least 6 to 7 hours of direct Sun. If you get that much then there is a Bermuda I think will work that is available in Phoenix called Celebration. Celebration is has a little shade tolerance and needs at least 5 to 6 hours of direct Sun. But there is a catch. It is Hybrid meaning only from sod. If you have too much shade really only leaves you one option to use Palmetto Saint Augustine and like any hybrid is from Sod only.

As for the front, well I hate to see you have to grow SA in the back and Bermuda in the front. They have completely different maintenance requirements.

At this point I recommend you strongly consider using Palmetto Saint Augustine in both front and back. If you insist on seeded Bermuda, make it Midiron as it is the toughest most drought resistant, salt tolerant, and tough as nails. For Phoenix I think it is the best choice even over the hybrids because it is simply tailored to the valley. Does not look quite as good as 419 or Celebration, bu twill out perform either one in the extreme conditions. It can be maintained at 1.5 inches which means less mowing and water which is important down there. Mowing your yard every 3 days in 100+ heat is just brutal.

Texas Weed, and Dchall,

I measured the amount of sunshine each part of the lawn gets by taking pictures every hour. I figured that each part of the lawn gets a minimum of 5hrs. I am planning to get the trees thinned so that it gets even more.

There is also healthy bermuda in the 700sqft lawn in the mid patch that gets the most sun. So I sprayed Spectracide to kill the broadleaf weeds. I am going to seed once the temperatures are a minimum 65C. I am not going to use glyphosate.

I will follow the same in the 200sqft lawn as well, and it gets minimum 7hrs sunshine. I am watering daily to revive the Bermuda. If not, I will seed this patch as well.

As for the Poa Annua, I am not going to do anything but wait for the temperatures to kill it. In the fall, I will use a pre-emergent to keep it from coming.

I really appreciate all the advice you both gave me, and the service you do for this forum.

If the bermuda has not revived with even 2 days of water, it's dead. Now would be a good time to stop all watering there and evaluate what you want to do. Daily watering always sprouts weed seeds. Weed seeds LOVE daily watering, which is why spring seeding usually goes awry. If you want to put bermuda seed there, then wait another month. If you want to put in St Aug, you can do that now by sod.