Well I bought the Fiskars Momentum Reel Mower and I have it set to about 2 notches below the lowest which I believe is about 1.75" or so. I bought it about three weeks ago and we've mowed every 3 days since we got it. I haven't noticed a huge difference in the way the lawn looks yet other than it is nicely manicured all the time. I trim every two weeks. The grass doesn't look anything like the above pictured lawns which are really nice looking. I mean it's green but it's got a fair amount of brown to it as well. I'm watering once a week for an hour in each zone but haven't done the tuna can test yet. I stagger that once a week watering into 4 different runs of 15 minutes each to try to avoid run-off. I am going to put more fertilizer down next weekend. I'm very much enjoying the Fiskars mower. It takes me about 30 minutes to mow and I calculated out the lawn square footage to right at about 2000 square feet. My wife is helping me out with some of the mowing and she will get up and mow at 6am during the week and it doesn't wake our neighbors. I was hoping to see the grass thicken up more now that I'm watering properly and mowing lower and more frequently. I'm not giving up hope yet. I'm staring out at my lawn a couple times per day and trying to see if it's looking better yet while continuing to read these forums. I'll definitely scalp it to 1" next year and try to maintain that height all season.

As to the comments on golf greens must be talking about northern golf courses that use Bent Grass and other cool season grasses in the fairways and rough. Tifway-I aka 419 is a semi dwarf Bermuda grass developed specifically for golf courses in a joint venture by the USDA, Georgia Coastal Plain Experiment Station, and the U.S. and Southern Golf Associations in Tifton Georgia. It was breed to be cut very short. If cut every other day the grass blade and stolons will grow horizontally along the ground forming a very tight turf of sod. If allowed or not mowed frequently enough both stolons and grass blades will start to grow vertically to compete for sun light. When it does that it will thin out as the grass below it gets shaded out and starts to die off. You can grow Tifway-I higher than 1 inch if you wish, but understand the consequences. Those with rotary mower have no choice. With a rotary mower \, even with a reel mower you are going to have to raise the cutting height as summer goes along and the grass thickens up. Even golf courses wiht Bermuda fairways have to raise cutting heights a bit as summer progresses except for the greens. For the greens they have a secret you cannot duplicate very easily. They verticut, punch holes, and top dress with sand every few weeks. What happens as summer progresses the growth rate explodes. The grass thickens up so tight it literally pushes itself up growing layer upon layer. If you take your fingers and dig through the grass you will see what I mean. It will be layers upon layers of stolon growth making a tight fabric like material. You really have to dig hard to get through to find dirt.

Hi rager, thanks for the reply. Here is a picture where I've circled the major area that i think was impacted from lack of water the circled area turned silvery gray from lack of water prior to turning brown. When i look closely in that area i don't see any green at all yet. I didn't mean to imply it was dead and never coming back, just that it shows no green at all currently. There are a bunch of other smaller areas that have been impacted by either dog pee or poop, or something else. Curious how I would determine dead vs. dormant, and curious how it would go dormant in the middle of summer, stress? Lack of XYZ? When sod was laid nothing was added, no lime, no fertilizer, no pre-emergent no nothin. I hadn't researched it and was trusting landscaper to do it right, i was wrong to have trusted him. Following his instructions i waited 4 weeks for first mow, and finally decided to call a lawn service company to take care of chems and fertilzer and any disease/issue that crops up. They said they needed to wait further because it was still too new to do anything to, and they explained to me what should have been done, and how some of it would have to wait till next year (crabgrass etc.). They said i could put some starter fertilizer on it which i did, but they said that would also cause broad leaf weeds to grow. They came out for the 1st time a month ago, sprayed for broad leaf weeds, not sure if fertilizer was applied, and told me to water more. I started looking into buying a smaller mower because of all the scalping that was occurring and the more i read the more i realized i need to do. This all lead to reel mower purchase and attempt to shorten grass mowing height but i see that i should just wait till next spring for that.

ooops, did I miss/forget something about not applying fertilizer in the heat? I mulch mow, or I should say my lawn guy does. I just put down and watered in my second application of supergreen on my Bermuda only as this was recommended monthly through October as a way to choke out the crazy crabgrass invasion I am dealing with. My prize lawn is the Turfallo patch which is doing great with no fertilizer or water from me. No crabgrass at all in the Turfallo! I think it may have to do with the fact that I prepped the area in March with cardboard and thick newspaper covered with top soil and mulch - must have prevented the crab seeds from germinating. Too bad I cant do that every year...I'd end up with a hill!