How to nurture a lawn torn up by a sprinkler install? (SA, TX)
bobstrauss
8 years ago
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dmt4641
8 years agolast modified: 8 years agoreeljake
8 years agoRelated Discussions
St. Augustine lawn help
Comments (10)I'm doing an experiment with unmowed St Augustine. Originally I did not think the grass would get taller than 10 inches, but it is easily 36 inches in one spot under a tree. Here is a picture I took last year. The purpose of the experiment was to demonstrate the benefits that lou mentioned above. I stopped mowing in October of 2011. The location is George West, TX on the edge of the Texas desert. Temps are above 95 from mid May through mid October with humidity running 40-50% most of the time. Since then I have only watered the grass when and where it was calling out to me for water. At no time have I watered more frequently than once per week. There is one spot under a tree on the east side of the house where I have not watered at all since 10/2011. In fact that is where the dog picture was taken. At the time it was about 30 inches high right there. Also since then I have not fertilized and used no insecticide or herbicide. As you can see there is no weed pressure at all - and I am surrounded by fields of King Ranch bluestem. There are places in the yard with plenty of bluestem, bermuda, and other weeds, but those areas are not part of this experiment. So the point of mentioning this is that taller St Aug will resist all the problems you might have with anything else. I always suggest people weld their mower at the highest position to prevent your well-meaning brother in lawn from doing you a favor and scalping your lawn back down "to where it should be." Tall St Aug (4 inches, not 40) is very lush looking and will solve your problems. Another issue you should watch for is drought stress near the sidewalk. Sidewalks take up sunlight all day and remain warm much longer that the soil under the grass. The soil near the sidewalk will get warmer during the day and remain warm until the next day. This tends to drive off the moisture through evaporation near the sidewalk and dry out the grass. The solution is to water more deeply, not more often. Generally I agree that your only problem is the grass roots are not up to speed yet. Give it another month and take another picture to compare. You should see improvement. Set your mower high, water deeply and infrequently, and fertilize and you will have a lawn like your neighbor. I prefer organic fertilizer because I am lazy and don't like to measure, but you can use chemical and get good results, too....See MoreLas Vegas Lawn Problems
Comments (12)So I take it that if the fescue is dead, then its dead. I can't revive it without re-seeding, correct? Bah. Yep when it is dead it is done and has to be reseeded. Bermuda on the other hand goes dormant when it does not receive enough water, and comes back with water. However it will not wait forever and will also eventually die. Question about bermuda - the bermuda I've seen around Las Vegas needs to be trimmed very short. Its almost like a carpet. I have doubts as to whether my mower can actually mow that short. Yes Bermuda is kept very short. That is why I mentioned it has to be mowed at least twice a week if irrigated and fed. However not all Bermuda grass is alike as their are many varieties all requiring different maintenance techniques. 1. Most of the common types from seed are used for pasture hay and erosion control and those are not mowed but rather cut once or twice a year to harvest hay. They are rarely ever fertilized except once in the spring and never irrigated. Not something you would want for a turf grass 2. Improved common seeded types for turf grass and the quality varies quite a bit in leaf size and cutting height. Some like Princess (aka P77) are near golf coarse quality requiring to be kept very short of 1 inch or less, fertilizing every 30 days during growing season, regular irrigation to maintain color. The there are several varieties which are medium quality than can be maintained around 1 to 2 inches which is probable the best fit for you. They still require frequent fertilizing and irrigation to maintain color, but you can have a decent looking stand using a push mower set for 1-1/2 inches. 3. Then there are the hybrids varieties. These are from sod, plug, or sprigs only. No seed available for hybrids. These are the high quality varities and they fall into two classes semi-dwarf, and dwarf. I will not go into dwarf varieties because they are stickily professional care used for golf greens and very wealthy people who have full time pros maintaining it. What you likely see around town and on all golf coarse fairways and tee boxes is a semi-dwarf hybrid variety. The two most common varieties used and widely grown by sod farms is Tifway-I (aka 419), and TifSport. In most states where Bermuda grass is grown Tifway-I is the default choice of all builders and landscapers. TifSport is gaining popularity as it is a little finer grain, denser, and better cold tolerance than Tifway-I. Either way they are both fairly high input grasses and best maintained at 1-inch or less with a reel type mower. However many and I would say most maintain them with a rotary mower between 1 and 2 inches. However those that do use a rotary mower do so because that came with there home and they just do not know better. It works, but not optimal. As to watering I split a different way than David recommends. Normally I would agree once a week with a deep soaking is the best method as a rule of thumb. But not for out here. Unless you are blessed and top soil was shipped in to your yard, or in a flood plain where soil is carried in from flooding, you do not have soil. You have rubble and coarse granite/quarts sand eroded from the surrounding mountains of LV. There is nothing in it to hold water and coupled with bone dry 10% or less humidity and searing temps you have to water much more frequently than most folks do. In summer once a day is the normal practice out here. At least in Prescott and Phoenix it is. Maybe Vegas is different, but I doubt it as the soil and climate are very much alike except Vegas is a little cooler than Phoenix. You guys only get up to 110, where Phoenix 115 is long sleeve shirt weather in summer. Now with that said I can say you are watering too frequently at 3 times a day for a few minutes each time. To be honest I do not know exactly what to recommend, other than when you do water, do so very early in the morning, and only once in a day. I imagine during cooler months once about every 3 or 4 days. During the blistering summer days it will take watering every day in the mornings. A lot is going to depend on which grass type you choose and actual soil conditions. I suggest you go around to a few nurseries and landscape companies to seek advice, maybe even visit a golf course and talk to a supt. You should be able to get a pretty good idea if you do that. Or if you have a neighbor with an impressive yard, stop by and ask them as most people will be flattered and tell you exactly what they do unless they pay someone to do it for them. I know from visiting Vegas often and now living in AZ, yards are rare even in the upper class neighborhoods. Just takes too much WATER to maintain them. That is why I mention Buffalo grass to be considered....See MoreSt. Augustine sod, help....
Comments (12)Pictures are a big help! Thanks Firstly: yes, that is St Augustine. The next to last picture does show fungal lesions. The easiest treatment for that, especially with our warm weather, is ordinary corn meal. I realize that seems hard to believe, but it is a microbiological solution. Corn meal attracts various fungi to decompose it. After the population of those fungi grows from eating the corn meal, then another fungus comes in as a predator on the first fungi. Once the population of the secondary fungus grows large enough, it will spread and "eat" the fungus causing your disease and kill it. I have gotten that same disease almost every year since 2001. It will continually spread if you don't stop it. Corn meal was the one thing that worked for me. Apply at 20 pounds per 1,000 square feet now and repeat in 3 weeks. Get the corn meal at your local feed store. Call first because there is another product they are familiar with called corn GLUTEN meal. You don't want that. You want ordinary whole ground corn meal. Cracked corn will work, too. Deer corn will work but it will give you a field of corn. Being in Brownsville, you can get a 25-pound bag of corn flour at HEB. Don't get the stuff that is tortilla mix. That has baking powder in it. You just want plain ground corn. There are almost no insects that hurt St Augustine. Fire ants might smother part or eat the roots, but generally they are just a nuisance...as you well know. The red ants are not a problem. Any tiny hopping insects you see are not a problem. By the way, corn meal is a low grade organic fertilizer. You will see the lawn green up about 3 weeks after you apply it. With the second application of corn meal, you may not need to fertilize again until next April (after the spring flush of rapid growth is over). If you stick with Milorganite, you can apply that any time and not have a problem. Keep checking to see that the sod is knitting down into the underlying soil....See MoreHas anyone tried LawnBeltUSA.com ??
Comments (32)We purchased the lawnbelt products beginning of July and are incredibly disappointed. I had to rent a machine to do the canals for the hoses because my lawn is by no means as soft as what they show on their website so; Try to make a sample canal for a few feet to see if you have the same problem as I did. They do not ship their products in a timely manner, everything takes at least one to two weeks to deliver and if you need to order additional items or return something, well, with my situation, I returned a product on July 27 2014 and ordered the correct part while I had them on the phone, (Yes, I was pissed that this process is taking so long and mentioned they should make their web page a little easier to maneuver), the rep assured me they would mail out the replacement part and credit me the RMA as soon as received, so I ordered the replacement part via paypal while on the phone with the rep and told him I just ordered it, to date my lawn is still all torn up into canals and I haven't received the replacement parts or received any type of credit for the parts returned. I called their support line and they do not return my calls. All in all, I recommend what my landscaper said to me, if you are going to do it yourself, buy from a local store that way if anything goes wrong with a part or you need additional parts or need to exchange something, you're not looking at an additional two to three weeks.. Now my kids lost out the whole summer because the lawn was torn into canals and they couldn't play soccer or run around in the yard. Now I'm stuck with hundred of dollars worth of parts and the return policy is over and done with so I am at their mercy. And if I tell you how much I really spent; I know now there are no savings using LawnBelt's products. Sounded like a great idea......See Morebobstrauss
8 years agodmt4641
8 years ago
dchall_san_antonio
8 years agobobstrauss
8 years agodchall_san_antonio
8 years agobobstrauss
8 years agoowlnsr
8 years agolast modified: 8 years agoI just installed irrigation this spring myself.
i did the install myself, including digging trenches by hand.
I used an edger to cut and pull up away the turf, then I set it aside.
Then I used a trench shovel to finish the trench, placing the soil on tarps.
After installing the pipes, flushing, installing the heads and testing, I back filled the trenches, sprinkled some Milorganite on the soil, and then laid the turf I cut out back inside the trench. Then I applied a thin layer on compost (Black Kow manure).
A couple of days later, its like it never even happened. I can't tell where I actually trenched. The main thing that's annoyed me is the areas around the trench (where I was working) were bent over for a few days. Two lawn mows later, though, and the areas stood back up like normal. Note: I do plan in coming back every few months and putting a thin layer of topsoil on top to account for any settling.
bobstrauss
7 years agoFirst of all: owlnsr - well done! Very impressed with the work you did there. Sometimes going the DIY route, you can take the time to do a cleaner job than the pros. I'm sure it wasn't easy but that looks fantastic.
As for my Zeon Zoysia recovery - I'd like to share a belated update with you all.
These pictures were taken in my back yard on June 5th, 2016, a week or two after the install. Of course I was pretty upset with the damage, considering how much effort I put into getting it back in shape (hand-watering, as my fiancee had neglected it while I was on an overseas assignment). At least I didn't have to spend countless hours with a hose in my hand after work anymore.
And now here are the same angles on August 13, 2016, little over two months later. That yellow patch in the first pic is damage from wasp spray, which has since recovered. Since August it hasn't improved that much, but it has a little. It doesn't look nearly as nice, color-wise, in winter, but it has filled in a bit beyond what can be seen in these photos.
FWIW - even though Zeon Zoysia is quite shade tolerant, the areas that get full sun (primarily my backyard) have recovered many times faster than my heavily shaded areas (mainly in front). I did my best to thin out my live oaks in front this summer, but it was too little too late - seems are still quite obvious. Here's one of the few pics I have that show how thin it is in comparison. Hopefully next year, with a little shampooing, alfalfa, and a bit of extra sunlight, things will look better.
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