I'm trying the newspaper layers (6-8 pages thick) topped with a thick layer of the free wood chippings I get from our city compost site. This is a SW corner of my yard where arborists cleared some trash trees/shrubs out between the lilac hedge and a small grove of conifers. There was a leggy honeysuckle and even leggier spirea left in the gap both of which I hard pruned to hopefully rejuvenate them. And I'd like to eventually get a couple of other things in there to flesh it out. I've always liked weeding - especially where the weeds are big and having them gone is really noticeable. I use a short handled spade, dig down and lever out the weeds. It is labor intensive, but once into it, you'd be suprised how much ground you can clear. Once I got out the major weeds in this corner, I scuffle hoed up the little weedlings and will see if the newspaper and wood chips suppress them for good. It looks nice anyway! I would think for layering to be successful, you should at least cut down the big weeds as close to ground level as possible - good green additions to a compost pile.

Where in the world are you? Do you live where there are watering restrictions? Now is the time to take a good look at the soil and make any corrections that will help make that soil into a good healthy place to grow plants. A good reliable soil test will be a start so you know what the soil pH and major nutrient levels are and these simple soil tests may be of some use as well. 1) Soil test for organic material. From that soil sample put enough of the rest to make a 4 inch level in a clear 1 quart jar, with a tight fitting lid. Fill that jar with water and replace the lid, tightly. Shake the jar vigorously and then let it stand for 24 hours. Your soil will settle out according to soil particle size and weight. For example, a good loam will have about 1-3/4 inch (about 45%) of sand on the bottom. about 1 inch (about 25%) of silt next, about 1 inch (25%) of clay above that, and about 1/4 inch (about 5%) of organic matter on the top. 2) Drainage. Dig a hole 1 foot square and 1 foot deep and fill that with water. After that water drains away refill the hole with more water and time how long it takes that to drain away. Anything less than 2 hours and your soil drains’ too quickly and needs more organic matter to slow that drainage down. Anything over 6 hours and the soil drains too slowly and needs lots of organic matter to speed it up. 3) Tilth. Take a handful of your slightly damp soil and squeeze it tightly. When the pressure is released the soil should hold together in that clump, but when poked with a finger that clump should fall apart. 4) Smell. What does your soil smell like? A pleasant, rich earthy odor? Putrid, offensive, repugnant odor? The more organic matter in your soil the more active the soil bacteria will be and the nicer your soil will smell, to a point. Too much organic matter can be bad as well. 5) Life. How many earthworms per shovel full were there? 5 or more indicates a pretty healthy soil. Fewer than 5, according to the Natural Resources Conservation Service, indicates a soil that is not healthy. kimmq is klimmsr

I believe it's a watering issue but hard to tell if it's too much or too little. If you get a disease that rots the roots, then the grass on top looks dry as if it was too little water...which it is up top but not below. The general hot weather watering guideline is 1 inch per week, applied all at one time. You're applying 3x per week. If you are applying on the order of 3 inches per week, then it is likely a disease issue. If you are watering less than an inch per week, then it is too little water. The way to find out how much water is going down is to put out cat food or tuna cans in the yard. Put some in the healthy looking area and some in the dry area. Turn on the system and see how much water you collect during a normal watering cycle. If the cans are almost full, you are watering way too much. If they are less than 1/3 full, then you are not watering enough. If you are getting about an inch per week, then the tune up would be to increase the duration of watering until you are getting a full inch, and at the same time back off on the frequency. By the way you're doing everything else right. Late spring fertilizer, check! Mowing high, check! Spot spraying weeds, check! Those are great pictures, too. Someone's been doing some homework.

Maybe I can save you some money on organic fertilizer. If you look at the ingredients on the bag of most organic fertilizers you will see they contain high protein grains, beans, seeds, and nuts. The list includes soybean, wheat, corn, corn gluten meal, and alfalfa. These are often fortified with animal byproducts like feather meal, fish meal, bone meal, blood meal, and poultry litter. The important point is the high protein values of these materials. Another important point is the speed of release for these materials. This element of organics is harder to quantify, but generally blood meal is considered "hot," while feather meal is considered icy cold. What that means is if you get too much blood meal all at one time, you can burn and kill plants. Straight poultry litter has limits, too; however, the rest of the items on the list have no practical limit to their application. The impractical limit is when you have smothered the grass with the sheer poundage of product. The product will not burn the plants, but the lack of sunlight and air circulation will kill the plants. Generally the fertilizers are heavy in ground grains and sometimes fortified with blood meal. Of the grains, corn gluten meal and soybean are the richest in protein. Those are followed by alfalfa, wheat, corn and even coffee grounds. Protein contains nitrogen molecules and will get processed into plant food by the microbes living in the soil. With all that in mind, what I do is use straight alfalfa pellets (aka rabbit or chinchilla chow) at a rate of 20 pounds per 1,000 square feet. Soybean meal is prohibitively expensive in my part of Texas, but alfalfa and corn are easy to get. You can find these materials at your local feed stores. Call ahead first to get availability and compare pricing. The application rate for the grains is 15-20 pounds per 1,000 square feet. Grains almost always take 3 full weeks to show the fertilizer effect. The reason for this "slow release" effect is that's how long it takes for the biology in the soil to process the raw food into plant food. Here is a picture posted by mrmumbles several years ago showing how well organic fertilizers work. He tossed a handful of alfalfa pellets onto his zoysia lawn, and this is what happened.The fertilizer was applied in mid May and the picture was taken in mid June. You can clearly see the improved color, density, and growth of the grass from the alfalfa. So this stuff works. If you let the lawn go without fertilizer and it thins out like mrmumbles did, then weeds can creep into the thin spots. But if you keep a routine of organic fertilizer going, you should certainly minimize the thin spots. Having said that, zoysia is a sod forming turf while your grasses are bunch type grasses. Bunch grasses do not form dense turf unless you have seeded up to a dense turf.