I see you were following a previous discussion about St Augustine. It certainly can do well with more shade than most other grasses can tolerate. Can you please post a picture of the problem area? If you can get the tree in the picture that would help. Maybe take the picture from across the street.

Also what kind of pepper? Is it a Brazilian pepper or the more common "California" pepper tree? Brazilian pepper is more compact while the California pepper can become a giant tree. Also the Brazilian pepper is happy living in a swamp while the California pepper cannot tolerate much water. In that sense the Cal pepper and grass are incompatible. That tree and its roots are the problem you're facing. If you have the Cal pepper, would you consider having it removed and replaced with a more lawn friendly tree? The first thing that came to mind was jacaranda mimosifolia. While those also get huge, they don't cast the same amount of shade as the Cal pepper. They also have an unbelievable spring floral show while the peppers only claim to fame is the tiny berries.

My parents moved to Palm Desert in the 70s, and one of their neighbors had artificial grass. Palm Desert is already hot, but you could feel the heat radiating off that plastic grass. It also had the feature of always looking dirty. You need to clean that stuff. It's not just leaves blowing in but the dust doesn't seem to wash off easily. It needs the occasional soap and water scrub.

You have tried seed made for shady areas I presume? Grass also needs a lot of water. Is there an option other than artificial turf?

Here is a picture. The tree is large and old. Can’t show grass due to construction staging.

Oops, here is the photo. My tree is the one behind the umbrellas that has been trimmed. The other trees are my neighbors.

Can't exactly ID the tree with that photo, but in general it looks more like Brazilian pepper.

Are you putting grass in where the umbrellas are in the picture? I would say either St Augustine or one of the three Marathon varieties of fescue should work there. St Augustine might require less water, but probably not noticeably less. Still need to water deeply every 2 weeks.

Artificial turf in that area would need daily blow off with a leaf blower. With living turf tree leaves enter the turf and decompose. With plastic grass that decomposition doesn't happen.

yes. I would be placing grass at the end of the decking where the umbrellas are located. What kinda marathon would you recommend? Would sod work or would you recommend starting from seed?

I saw a lot of negative discussions On this site about using marathon type grass in Southern California But maybe this is different as I am 5 miles from the beach and the weather doesn’t get very hot that often.

Yes, you are correct. My name is on most of those negative discussions. I believe people are being irresponsible with the state's natural resources when trying to grow fescue grasses in Palm Springs, for example. But they do. Even El Monte is too far inland in my opinion. IF you are in the area affected by "late night and early morning low clouds and fog near the coast, burning off by eleven," followed up by the 2:00 sea breeze, then go ahead and try the Marathon fescues. I think you qualify.

I don't have a strong opinion on the three Marathons. MI is dwarf. MII is dwarfer. MIII is dwarfest. All that means is they grow slow and slower and slowest. I might favor MI because mowing high works best for fescue, and the MI should get tall quicker than the others. Although for an area like yours, I would not even have a lawn mower. I'd get a good string trimmer. I used to trim several thousand feet of grass at 18 inches tall. It's not that hard. And yes, that was 18 inches. It was part of an experiment.

More specifically to you, have you had problems growing grass in your back yard prior to the construction? Was the pool part of the construction, and if not, did you have any problems following the pool install?

We just never had luck with grass in the backyard. Now, the problem could be the ability of my gardner and us. Because we have installed a gas line, I know that our dirt is heavy clay. I don't even remember the process we used years ago when we tried to install grass,

The pool has always been here and we just traded concrete decking for dry installed pavers.

I know someone who had tried all sort of grasses over the years with a yard that part shady part sunny die to trees and climactic conditions such as yours.

And then add in the weeks during the summer when you are not even allowed to water the lawn when there is the CA drought.

They finally went to artificial turf, and the lawn looks marvelous all the time, with minimal upkeep.

We're just east of Pasadena. I can tell you our backyard is pretty much shaded, mostly by oaks. Really not much sun and our St. Augustine does very well. Here are a couple photos. It was cloudy and raining in the second pic, but most of the grass seen gets shade with dollops of sun as seen in the first pic.

chloebud, I don't want to get sidetracked, but can I ask what your watering schedule is? How often and for how long do you water? Nice looking yard, by the way.

It depends on the time of year. In Spring it might be 2-3 times a week. During the summer we often have the sprinklers going 3-4 times per week, especially in front since it gets much more sun. If it gets really hot, we don't increase the watering frequency. Instead we water a bit longer each time...maybe 15-20 minutes. Winter just depends on the rain we get, but it can be a couple times per week. Someone told me to water for 6-8 minutes, turn it off to soak in, then turn back on for another 6 minutes or so. To be honest, I'm not sure this is all the right way, but it seems to work for us.

Right now the wind's blowing so hard the last thing on my mind is the grass. I'm much more concerned with all the OLD oak trees around us.

Ok. I have had two installers by the house. The first said I could install grass in the yard.Assuming sprinklers work (they do), I would need to pay for prep (removing dirt and some surface roots) and sod install. The second said I could install lawn, but would need prep, new sprinkler layout and sod. But he also said the only way the lawn would make it would be to seed once a year and keep my pepper tree cut back. If I did it his way, the cost would be the same as artificial turf when you add in his cost for sprinkler. Thoughts?

traciel:

First installer sounds reasonable. Second one sounds like he has big expenses and needs a recurring gig. Sure, annual overseeding is a thing for fescue, but it is sometimes more of a habit than a requirement. It is certainly easy especially for a small area like yours. Sometimes fescue will thin out in spots. It doesn't take a professional to drop a handful of matching seed onto the thin spots every September. And annual trimming of a tree is over the top. New sprinkler layout? Way over the top.

chloebud:

On another post, Ken Adrian point out that watering was an art. Here was my reply.

Ken Adrian has a point about watering being an art; however, it is based on some science. Here is what I generally say about watering:

The mantra for watering is deep and infrequent. Deep means 1 inch all at one time. Frequency depends on many factors such as air temperature, wind, direct sunlight, soil type, turf type, mowing height, humidity, and some other factors. When you add everything up and do the subtraction, the predominant factor is the daily high temperature. What this means is for high temperatures below 70 degrees, deep water once a month. For temps between 70 and 80, deep water once every 3 weeks. For temps between 80 and 90, water every 2 weeks. For temps between 90 and 100, deep water once per week. For temps between 100 and 105, water every 5 days. For temps above that, water every 3-4 days. The main take-away from the sciency part is that you should never be watering every day or every 2 days. Think deep and infrequent.

Having said that, now we get into the art. For example I live where the temps run in the high 90s most of the summer. Do I water every week? Not really. I water about 3/4-inch every 10 days. Our temps have dropped to the 80s with a lot of cloud cover but low humidity. The last time I watered was Oct 9. I'm going to water today at the 4 week point. The grass still looks alive, but the blades are folding together, so it needs it, finally. Watching the grass for it's needs is the art on top of the science. If you go 2 weeks in the summer and it looks good, stretch it out a little.

Deep watering encourages deeper roots. Deep roots find nutrients long lost to rootdom when the plants are watered frequently. If the grass gets frequent watering, it does not need to grow deep roots. If you have been watering frequently, you're going to have to wean the lawn off of that schedule into deeper and less frequent watering. Start by doing the can test to time how long it takes to fill the cat food or tuna cans.

If you get runoff before filling the cans, stop watering immediately and let the water soak in for 15 to 30 minutes. Then resume watering and timing. Stop as necessary to prevent runoff. To prevent runoff in the future and to encourage deep water penetration, spray a surfactant like shampoo on the lawn using a hose end sprayer. The application rate is 3 ounces per 1,000 square feet, but that is a minimum. You can double or triple the amount with no adverse effect. Follow that up with 1/2-inch of water to get the shampoo down deep into the soil. I used baby shampoo once in 2012 and never needed to spray again, so it is a good bargain.

Given the lateness of the season, I am wondering if I should just try partial shade grass seed as recommended by garden center. Especially if the sod is just going to quickly go dormant due to the cold weather

You won't quite have the weather issues in LA that others do with late plantings, but genetics do play a part in that--as does reduction in sunlight. Seed will be slow to establish in cooler weather, or simply later in the season as it just doesn't want to go off in November quite so easily (but it will!).

Looking at your 10-day, it doesn't look like it's going to be much of an issue for you either way. Sod would do just fine in that weather as well and I don't see it dropping dormant any time soon. The sixties are near-perfect grass weather.

Okay, so I am going to give it one last try. I decided to go with Pacific Sod. I assume I should use Medallion Plus sod because of partial shade. Do you agree? Here are my choices.

GN-1 Hybrid Bermuda (Tuesday & Friday deliveries only ) sqft .560

Medallion sqft .615

Medallion Dwarf with Bonsai sqft .625

Medallion Plus sqft .620

Sunclipse St Augustine sqft 1.170

Tifway 419 Hybrid Bermuda (Tuesday & Friday deliveries only )sqft .550

https://www.pacificsod.com

Not to be predictable, but I would go with their hybrid St Aug with a higher rating for shade and disease resistance.

Predictable. :-)

But it's not like it wouldn't do beautifully in LA, can't establish well in November, and won't be perfectly happy all year long.

For sod, keep it moist. Not wet, not soaked, not sodden, not dry, not dusty. Just moist, like a wrung-out sponge.

That can be 1 to 2 waterings per day of 10 to 20 minutes, depending on your environment and the soil. In your current weather, one good installation watering, then probably 1 per day of 10 minutes in November's cooler temps and lower sunlight, plus keep a close eye on it for a few weeks.

The two most common errors made are to soak it or to keep it far too dry. Keep it moist for 2 weeks, then very slowly back off--if it even thinks about browning out, step the water back up. If it browns even slightly during establishment, it's too dry. If it goes very brown, it's probably very too dry, but check--it could actually be drowning, and that's easy to figure out. If it's soaking wet, just before you water, it's drowning.

Then back off, making waterings longer but less often, until you reach whatever compromise you can in Los Angeles depending on the season. Probably weekly during the "winter" (what you people call a winter) for an inch at a time, three times a week during the desert summer at half an inch at a time.

Some grass grows better in shade than others. Choose the one that is supposed to grow well in shade in your area for most of the yard but consider moss or other shade tolerant ground cover in the most shady parts of the yard. Also, for the mostly shady parts of the yard that doesn't include any exposed tree roots, you might consider adding large pavers spaced in a pattern that make it usable as a patio or a part of your patio, if only for a bird bath to be placed there.

dchall_san_antonio You previously said: IF you are in the area affected by "late night and early morning low clouds and fog near the coast, burning off by eleven," followed up by the 2:00 sea breeze, then go ahead and try the Marathon fescues. I think you qualify.

I don't have a strong opinion on the three Marathons. MI is dwarf. MII is dwarfer. MIII is dwarfest. All that means is they grow slow and slower and slowest. I might favor MI because mowing high works best for fescue, and the MI should get tall quicker than the others.

Proud Papa Picture

I put this St Aug sod down on Oct 15 and today I noticed the first runner.

The weedlets by my foot have no chance.

dchall_san_antonio So you still think I am ok with the Marathon.

As far as location, yes.

Here are photos from the great grass experiment. The first two photos are extra pieces installed on the Sunny front yard. The grass is almost 10 inches tall. The other photos are from backyard installation in the shady area

The last photo is also the backyard photo. I’m noticing some straw like material now mixed in with the grass. Why is this? What is this?

As for the strawlike material, what is your watering schedule? and when did the grass go in?

The grass went in about 3 .5 weeks ago. We were on a twice a day watering schedule ( 9:00 am and 5:00 pm) everyday until last Saturday. The grass has never, ever been dry. In fact, it have had rather mild weather for the past week so the gardener reduced the watering to 4 days a week.

The little patches of grass we placed in the front yard have definitely grown faster than the back yard. It has grown twice as long as the back yard grass in the same time period.

Too little water can look the same as too much water. The problem is waterlogged roots don't get enough air. At this point you should be watering much more deeply and much less frequently. I would wean it back to watering once a week. You're about to get the seasonal December rains, so start weaning now. You don't need supplemental water if it rains.