Sorry to rain on the parade - it's just that your chances aren't good. There is no use throwing a thousand dollars worth of water at a plant this is likely going to die anyway. Since you are already midway through, you should look to minimize your losses. Definitely don't water if the ground is still moist. Making it soggy only leads to fungal problems in the heat. Also, you will have to keep watering frequently. However, since the roots are very shallow still on new grass, you don't have to water deeply. Don't water an inch - just enough to keep the top inch or 2 moist. If you manage to get any of this grass through the next couple of months, you will then want to reverse the plan and start watering less frequently but more deeply to encourage deep root growth.

Seebachers: Don't know if you're still looking for ornamental grasses for your garden, but if you are here's my small contribution. Sue and I live in Manistee, MI and since the town lies on Lake Michigan our climate is often moderated by the lake. Consequently, depending upon the severity of our winters, we may lie in zone 6 or zone 5. For that reason, I usually either purchase locally at the few better gardening areas or search for plants that are winter hardy to zone 5 or cooler. One of my favorite sources of information is the superb "PlantFinder" search/informational tool, which is part of the Kemper Center for Home Gardening at the wonderful Missouri Botanical Garden. This link will take you directly to their "seach" section. If you will scroll down a bit, you find a section called "Taxonomy" click on "Plant type" and select "ornamental grasses". Just below you'll see a section called "Plant requirements" go to the "zone" section and select "5". The scroll down to the bottom of the page and submit your search. You'll then be taken to an extensive listing of plants by their botanical names, their common name(s); their approximate height, and then their appropriate zone range. Each of the botanical listing will provide you with a link to more detailed information and, in most cases, a photograph or two. Here's a link to one of the grasses that I've added to our garden this fall. The plant is "Chasmanthium latifolium" also known - at this site - as "Inland Sea Oats" and by "Northern Sea Oats" on this forum. http://www.mobot.org/gardeninghelp/plantfinder/Plant.asp?code=A240 Another ornamental grass which I have planted in our garden is Miscanthus 'Purpurascens', which goes by several common names, such as "Flame grass". In their "noteworthy features" sections, I noted the following statement: "Flame grass, as the common name suggests, is noted for its superior orange-red fall color. It is a compact, upright, warm season, clump-forming ornamental grass which typically grows to 3-4' (infrequently to 5') tall. Features medium green blades (1/2" wide) with a reddish tinge which gradually develop further reddish hues as summer progresses, eventually turning a brilliant orange-red in fall." Fortunately, I was able to find a local source and added two of this grass to our garden. Here's the link: http://www.mobot.org/gardeninghelp/plantfinder/Plant.asp?code=E220 FYI - you also note that this site does provide both local sources for St. Louis area gardeners and online sources for the rest of us. Another one of the wonderful feature of the search/informational tool of the superb Missouri Botanical Gardens. It is a must visit- especially in the second and third week in June when nearly everything is in bloom. If you wish to take a "virtual tour" of some of this garden's delights here is the link for the tour. http://www.mobot.org/hort/gardens/overview.shtml If you scroll all the way down, there is a link to a more detailed/photographic tour of many sections of this outstanding garden. But here's a direct link for a more detailed look. http://www.mobot.org/hort/tours/tourintro.shtml Finally, if you wish to exlore the world of "Ornamental Grasses" further and also wish to have a handy reference guide available, you might consider the purchase of Rick Darke's "Timber Press Pocket Guide to Ornamental Grasses" or if you wish more extensive information you'll find it in his book "The Color Encyclopedia of Ornamental Grasses" Well, I suspect that you know have more information than you thought possible or possibly wanted. ;>) Best wishes in your gardening endeavors!! Bill http://www.mobot.org/gardeninghelp/plantfinder/Search.asp

Hey Ryan. One thing we have learned by looking at thousands of lawn pictures is...don't take the pictures on a sunny day. The contrast is too strong to see the detail we need. Having said that, yours are fine for this question. Where exactly do you live in SoCal? Oildale or Heber? Likely you live somewhere in between, but you get my drift. SoCal covers a lot of mileage where the zones move around as does the microclimate and the soil. I lived in Riverside for 15 years and elsewhere around the area for 16 more. In addition to the living I traveled from Santa Barbara to San Diego quite often and should be able to help if you can be fairly specific. I don't need your nearest cross street, but at least name the town. If you live west of the 5 and south of the Tehachipis, then Marathon II should be fine. If you are east of the 5 and/or inland of the coastal hills, then Marathon II is a water hog and you should consider either St Augustine or bermuda. Since bermuda will not grow in the shade, that leaves St Augustine. St Aug is a coarse bladed grass which will look like crabgrass to you if you are used to the Marathon II. But St Aug behaves much better than crabgrass. I just got this picture from a friend in Phoenix this weekend. It really shows what St Aug looks like in action. He was getting ready to mow... He just sodded that lawn this year. You can see how dense it is in the shade. Like a growing number of us, he's all organic. Here it is after mowing and before edging... Anyway I suspect watering is more your problem than shade. Do you water for 10 minutes every day? That is the general advice you get from the so-called professionals in SoCal. That advice is wrong. Deep and infrequent is the universal mantra for watering a lawn. Generally deep means 1 full inch all at one time. Infrequent means ONCE a MONTH this time of year for most of SoCal west of Mt San Jacinto. You cannot go cold turkey on this watering if you have been watering it every day all winter. What you can do is start to increase the time from 10 minutes to 20 and then back off on the daily part. Watch the grass for signs of stress and then water. The grass will eventually develop deeper and deeper roots which can stand much longer periods without surface water. I have a house on the edge of the Texas desert with parts of the lawn in shade that have not had irrigation water since October of 2011 and the grass looks fine. There are other circumstances in my situation, but the point is if you can develop the deep roots, the grass will not need anything close to daily watering. If you live where the temps get into the 90s in the summer, then you'll be watering once a week, but always 1 inch. If you or your soil has a problem with that, tell us what the issue is and we can likely help with that. Is this yard on the north side of the house? Does water seem to pool up in the area where the grass is not working? Worst case is you modify the shape of your flower beds and add more geraniums.

Spotty higher pH can happen if you got the soil off of one particular section of the pile...that happened to contain the old B horizon with some limestone in it! In my case, I got the old subsoil on my lot, so it just kind of stank all around. * You said you targeted our phosphorus level higher than your own lawn. Is this due to the pH difference or something else? Is phosphorus bound in the soil at higher pH's, and is our pH (7.1 - 7.3) high enough to cause that? pH. If you look at the availability of P by pH, it drops as pH rises above seven. You're not that far over, the binding isn't extreme, so I just boosted the numbers a little bit. Your standard is around 220, most people with slightly acidic pH would be around 200. In your case, I wouldn't blink at anything between 200 and 300. I never use my own soil as a standard, per se, for anybody else's. Mine have given in to some experimental stuff, plus I've over-enhanced the gardens to match the (extreme) density and (extraordinarily high) performance I demand they support. My current P levels in the garden push 1,000. * What kind of quality issues can we expect from the low phosphorus level until it's corrected? Thin, weak, sparse growth that gets sick and dies easily, discolors easily, grows poorly, and generally doesn't look at all good. Installed sod would tend to thin out and die back over the course of a year or so if it isn't corrected, resulting in a lot of thin patches and blank areas. N, P, and K are the big three and absolutely have to be there in the correct proportions (N we take care of on an as-needed basis). * It sounds like the Milorganite is great stuff, but I'm very sensitive to odors, so I don't think it's a good fit for our lawn. If we used ferrous sulfate instead (being careful to sweep it off the concrete), what rate and frequency would you recommend? I assume we don't need to worry about lowering the soil pH too much with the ferrous sulfate since the starting pH is above 7.0. I'd be comfortable with ferrous sulfate (monohydrate or pentahydrate, it doesn't matter) at 3 pounds per thousand square feet in April, early October, and perhaps early November if the weather's holding. Keep an eye on the pH in this case, though, as iron sulfate is about an eighth as acidifying as pure elemental sulfur and does NOT require digging in to work! Never use iron during hotter months or when the soil's going to freeze solid for winter within two or three weeks of use.