Weekly cutting to ~ 3.5". I only water to supplement rain to give lawn ~1"/week. When I water, I do deep & infrequent. Last year I fertilized with inorganic w/Dimension just before the lilacs bloomed. Then with Milorganite ~6 weeks later. Then inorganic w/Dimension in the fall to try to head off this spring's poa. The worst areas are shaded, so things stay somewhat wet (that's where the moss was worst). But, other areas are full sun (maybe a bit of a dip on an otherwise elevated area...maybe another site for water aggregation). The area with dry blades but no clumping is full sun. The area with matted grass that easily pulled up was also full sun. Definately no fungicide. Two years ago I used grub preventer. Last year I saw no sign of grubs so I skipped it (I have 2 young children, so I was trying to keep pesticides to a minimum. We had a warmish autumn, so it is possible that when my landscaper stopped cutting my lawn, there may have been a little more growth after that mixed with other conditions to cause these problems. Not a lot of snow, but things have been pretty wet (I'm in the north east, in a suburb of New York City). Thanks

Not quite ready to give up yet, Tex. Dianna, you sound just like me when I first came to the Lawn Care Forum. I found this site looking for help with a new lawn I unknowingly drowned with water and was blaming my contractor because he told me to water every day. "Around here, folks water every day" is exactly what I told these guys, too. Because so many of them said much the same in the way of advice, I decided to try it and couldn't believe the results. What they were trying to explain finally clicked, so I began doing more research on the subject and found the professional turf sites, turfgrass research universities, the seed producers, advice columnists, everything and everywhere were saying the same things, which are the bottomline basics of lawn care. That all compelled me to do more research as well as conduct a few experiments of my own. I learned there is nothing more important to the health of your grass than proper watering and proper mowing. Believe me, I've studied a lot but that is little compared to some of these other folks on the forum. No one here would steer you wrong and if there is even the slightest information imparted incorrectly, someone will chime in to correct them and make sure you are provided enough information to work your lawn into the healthiest and most beautiful it can possibly be. I want to explain a little more of what Billl is saying. While your grass in the back may seem to be okay, trust that it is not thriving and it is not healthy if being watered every day. Frequent watering does not allow the roots to grow as deeply as they are supposed to. The life and health of the plant is totally dependent on the root system, and fescue grass has an extensive root system. When watered properly (deeply), the roots are allowed to grow as deep as they should. Shallow roots are weak, thin, and flimsy. Green grass is not equal to healthy grass. Unless the grass is healthy, it cannot thrive and tiller as it should, it cannot fight off disease it inherently is normally able to resist or tolerate, it cannot knit and form a thick, lush sod to help prevent weeds, and it cannot even produce its true genetic green color. What I neglected to suggest earlier, as Bill so aptly did, is to gradually back off watering rather than all at once. At this point, the grass is dependent on receiving it very often because you trained it to expect that. It doesn't need it though, and you can train the grass to be much less dependent on you for moisture and nutrients and to tell you when it wants water as I mentioned in the drought examples. Back off frequency while increasing the amount as Bill explained to work your way to just one inch just once a week. One inch of water will moisten the soil to a depth of 6-8 inches. Rather than sitting there in the upper layers of soil waiting to be fed, the roots will begin to grow downward looking for the moisture that one inch provided. See how it works? They will reach it and continue to grow beyond that point to receive the earth's water supply and natural nutrients for fertilizer. Then, you'll have a healthy root system. Just imagine yourself never being able to yawn or stretch out. Because you are located in a region of high temps, it may be necessary to irrigate more often as I mentioned earlier. That one inch can be stretched out over two or three days through the week to relieve heat stress. About the only thing we cannot tell you is exactly what species of grass you have. Without the advantage of sight to examine the parts of the plant, we're just trying to guess based on the clues you give us. Based on those clues, the only thing we know for relatively certain is it is a cool season type. You can find out for sure though by taking samples to the extension service I linked you to above. They are the real experts and will tell you the exact same as we tell you here. For starters, you can take advantage of their many publications. Type "lawn care" in the search box.

I got soil for my raised beds from Living Earth, it was pretty good. Nature's Way Resources is #1 in Houston, but it's wayy expensive and all the way up in Conroe. I think Living Earth is fine, but for my next beds I'll order top soil and improve it with homemade compost or do sheet composting with leaves, grass clippings, hay and possibly local manure from horse stables. I don't really trust what those big guys put in their compost. Welcome to H-town and congrats on the huge garden space!! Let me also suggest Bob Randall's book Year Round Gardening for Houston, available through the community-gardening organization he started, Urban Harvest (urbanharvest.org) It'll save you a lot of headache:-) Don't forget about the fruit tree sale in 2 weeks!! (Jan 17 at Rice Stadium) my blog is at sustainable-shire.blogspot.com :-)

I apologize for all this confusion. I have been having a lot of trouble! For some reason the edit button hasn't been appearing as an option, so I haven't been able to clean up my act! And when it does I have not been able to post more than one picture. Sometimes I can't even comment. I have been trying every which way . . . thus the mess. So . . . I hope this will go out. I appreciate any patience you have had! Patio -- At most it could be 14' x 16', but could be smaller also according to whatever fits well in a plan. Or the patio idea could be scrapped altogether if it doesn't fit well. We do have flagstones to work with if a patio/landing is an option. It does not need furniture on it. I played around with the idea of a pergola over the septic to disguise that, but don't know how to make it work well without it looking like it doesn't fit. I want to keep it simple but nice. I would like, if possible to have a sitting area/room for a bench over to the left where the Kousa is. Eventually the Kousa would give some shade. The septic pipes are not visible leading out from under the window on the right, but any planting there would have to be shallow rooted. The blue domes you see at the right are the septic tank domes -- the one furthest out from the window is the far end of the tank. Hope this clarifies things a little more.It worked!! If you need any more pictures . . . I'll try. Thank you for any help!