First Mowing

Lawns have greened up quickly in the last week or so with the warmer weather. So I got out and mowed for the first time of the season yesterday. Although most of the lawn didn't need it yet, I mowed the front lawn anyway to mulch up some leaves from the oak that fall and gather on the lawn during the winter.

Here are some photos of the front yard (after mowing):

Most of this grass didn't need mowing

Lots of weeds

Note the patch of the dubbed "new invader" on the left (patch of lighter colored grass).

Not much growth here

Overall, not looking too great. Lots of weeds again due to thinned turf. And it seems like the new grass planted in the fall of 2011 is again being slow to green up. This lead to the fungus problems last year. I'm not about to let that happen again, so I decided to be more proactive this year and applied a generous portion of fertilizer along with a pre-emergent crabgrass application (which also contains fertilizer). I ended up putting down about 4 lbs of Endure Crabgrass Preventer Plus and about 6 lbs of Espoma Organic Lawn Food which in total comes to roughly 1.15 lbs N/1000 sq. ft. (0.475 from the Endure and 0.675 from the Espoma). I applied more liberally to the younger grass. In addition the Espoma also contains some Phosphate and Potash (8% and 6% respectively). Lots of rain is in the forecast, so we shall see how this turns out.

On to the backyard:

Still a sad sight in the backyard considering how nice it was last spring and early summer, but I have hope that I can get it back, even if I have to plant more seed this fall. It's knowing when to fertilize that's the tricky part.

In other news...

The phlox is sprouting:

I trimmed back the hydrangea tree again:

The hybrid tea rose bush is growing:

The hydrangea bushes are growing:

The Sedums are sprouting:

And it appears that the Boxwoods are doing just fine after last years drought as I see new growth on most of them (and flowering on some):

The second from the right is the most iffy.

I guess I haven't mentioned this before, but I lost one Holly bush due to the drought last summer (despite watering them). It's visible in the last two photos above (the middle Holly in the upper right of both photos). I'll have to replace it this year. I don't think I lost anything else due to the drought, thankfully.

That's all for now.

Planting time!

Wow, it has been a while - a whole season in fact!

But you didn't miss much. Here's the summary: drought.

From May 2nd through August 3rd we received a total of 2.06" of rain. Also during this period we had extreme heat with 9 days over 100 degrees and 42 days in the 90s. To make matters worse, on July 13th a watering ban went into effect, prohibiting watering of lawns and limiting watering of plants. Up until that point I was irrigating about 2-3 times per week, but even that wasn't enough to keep the whole lawn green, particularly the areas that got the most sun. This was particularly devastating for the backyard since supia bluegrass doesn't like it dry, and I had just planted the fine fescue earlier in the year (this is why fall is the preferred time to plant).

Since then, however, we have received 13.64" of rain, enough to prompt the lifting of the water ban on September 5th!

But the damage is done. The backyard lawn now looks like it looked back in March, worse actually. Here's a look as of today:

It's not a pretty sight, but I'm hoping for a big comeback like what happened this spring as some of the bluegrass survived. I'm not planning on do any renovations in the backyard for this reason, so we'll see! I must admit that this damage probably wasn't entirely due to the drought - I fertilized it earlier in the season (before the watering ban), which it did not like (whoops)... but I'll save that story for another post.

The front yard fared much better than the back, but not without some damage. Here's a look:

Possible grub damage

Possible grub damage

This patch was killed by leaf rust

As a followup to the fungicide application back in May, it seemed to take care of the problem and I haven't noticed anymore since, which is great! However, it did do a number on the grass it infected and most of it died, so the patch noted above can't be blamed on the drought - it died well before.

The rest of the yard isn't looking too shabby:

As noted, some of the damage might actually have been from grubs. I'm not certain it was necessarily the drought since the majority of the rest of the grass went dormant and survived just fine.

Now what you don't see in these photos is the seed I put down on Thursday in those dead areas. I used the same approach for planting it that I used with the fine fescue in the spring:

1. With a hard-toothed rake, I removed as much of the dead grass as possible, working up the soil beneath as much as possible
2. Then I put down the seed, just eyeballing the amount. I'd say I probably put down about 3 lbs.
3. Next I used a hand-held tiller to work the seed into the top layer of the soil where it was feasible (basically just the most damaged areas where the soil was more exposed)
4. Finally I pat it down and walked over the areas to pack the loosened soil back down (and then 2.79" of heavy rain occurred last night to mat it down even more!)

The seed I used I found at a local nursery:

Endure Execu-Turf Premium Sod Blend

19.90% Midnight Kentucky Bluegrass
19.90% Nu Destiny Kentucky Bluegrass
19.86% Sudden Impact Kentucky Bluegrass
19.84% Beyond Kentucky Bluegrass
19.79% Ruby II Kentucky Bluegrass

I thought it was a good find with some good varieties! We'll see how it does. I noticed that it's the same brand as some good quality fertilizer I've used before.

I will probably put down some fertilizer at some point soon, too, but I haven't figured that out yet (as usual), so I'll save that for another post.

I'll be keeping my eye out for germination!

Caring for turf in times of heat and drought

This post will be a summary of some recent heat/drought-related posts off the always informative Purdue University Turf Tips site. I don't want to forget this great information.

The first post is titled The Heat is On!. This post gives some great information about keeping your lawn healthy in times of heat and drought like we've had this year (and also last year) in central Indiana. Here's my takeaway points:

• Temps above 87 degrees will cause cool season grasses to stop growing (due to photorespiration which occurs instead of photosynthesis)
• Lack of water can cause some grasses to go dormant such as Kentucky bluegrass (but not tall fescue!)
• When in drought, any traffic on the grass can cause damage to the plants, so don't mow and stay off the grass as much as possible
• You can keep grass green through drought by watering about 1 inch per week
• To keep grass alive during drought, water with 1/2 inch of water every 2-4 weeks
• Irrigating in the morning is best

The second post is titled Turf: Dead or Alive? and provides information on how to determine if grass is still alive after a dry period has ended and there has been some rain that has otherwise greened up the lawn. If brown grass still remains in some places, don't despair because it might still be alive. To tell, pull up some of the dead blades and look underneath for new growth. If new blades are coming up, the grass will likely recover. I have noticed a few areas of our lawn that is still quite brown despite the rest of the lawn greening up after our recent rains and I've wondered if it is dead (even though I watered occasionally throughout the drought). I checked and there are a few blades of green that have and are come up, so I guess we'll see if it recovers!

And finally, another great resource related to irrigation is the Irrigation Practices for Homelawns (AY-7) publication (also by Purdue). Some takeaways from this publication:

• Overwatering can potentially cause just as much if not more damage than underwatering (resulting in increased crabgrass, increased disease, shallow rooting, and a waste of water)
• Water when the first visible signs of stress appear
• First signs of stress include a blueish-green color, and when footprints remain after walking on it (and later the grass will wilt and turn a grayish-green color, before turning brown and dying/going dormant)
• Water only when it's needed instead of a regular set schedule
• Most Indiana lawns need about 1 to 1.5 inches of water per week
• It's best to water all at once so that the water reaches the deepest roots
• To measure the amount of water applied, put a dish out and water for a set amount of time to calculate the rate
• The ideal time to water is 4-8am
• Dormant grass can survive up to 4-6 weeks without water
• Water 1 to 1.5 inches ever 4-6 in drought conditions (this conflicts with info above, so I'm not sure which is correct)

These posts and publications have been extremely useful to me and I'm very grateful for the information that Purdue has and continues to publish!

2010: Part 2 - The Grass Project

Ok, so I like grass. Soft, plush, green healthy grass. We have some in our yard, actually, one spot of grass that has probably had just the right amount of sun and shade to protect it from the summer heat and keep it healthy without much maintenance over the years. I always enjoyed mowing that part of the lawn and I wished the whole lawn were like it.  A few years ago, it was probably a very nice lawn, but it wasn't any longer (at least to me). Like the rest of the gardens were when we moved in, the grass was thin in many spots and had various different types of grass present, and then crabgrass filled in the rest.

But even so, 2010 was a rough year on the lawn as it was for many lawns in the region. A lengthy drought occurred starting in late July that didn't end until November. But to make matters worse, earlier in the year I had spilled fertilizer in several places that ended up killing the grass in several spots. And, we had grubs that killed some large sections of the lawn. Here is how it looked:

Count the robins.

Note the thinned areas of dead grass, particularly the far right and the perimeter. Also, note the many robins feasting on the grubs. I count 15 in this photo. A few days later, there were over 40, but unfortunately they flew away before I could get a photo. Mmm... grubs! I'm glad they were happy, at least.

So, of course, I needed to do something, but what could I do? So, I started researching, first about grubs and then about repairing the grass. I quickly discovered the wonderfully informative Purdue Turfgrass Program site and the many great publications and subsequently started dreaming of a nice new lawn.

I found these instructions for establishing turfgrass from seed. But, there was a problem: it was already September and nearing the end of the optimum time period for planting new grass (August 15 to September 15 in Central Indiana). So, I decided to act fast and to try to squeeze it in. In hindsight, I probably should have waited or at least not gone straight to the deep-end like I ended up doing.

So much to do and so little time, I went to the hardware store and purchased a manual tiller. I took a day off of work and went to work on the dead areas to prepare the soil for replanting. But, then I got a crazy idea: why not replant some of the grass that I don't like while I'm at it? I think I was blinded by my desire for nice lush grass, because I started digging up the "old" grass and this is not how that should typically be done. You're supposed to kill it all first, then remove it, but this process can take a week or two - time I didn't have, so I decided to "improvise."

Soon, after several hours, blisters upon blisters, and with my shoulder about ready to come out of its socket, I could till no more, and I was nowhere near done. I probably should have just stopped here, but instead I decided to go to the store and rent a large power tiller. This made the job much easier and in turn allowed me to rip up even more of the lawn. Foolishly, I didn't even think about the sprinkler heads scattered throughout the lawn that were part of the (disabled) sprinkler system until I hit one of them - and then another, and another. Not to mention any buried cables, which thankfully I didn't encounter.

I'm not quite sure what I was thinking with all of this. It was turning into a nightmare and there was no turning back. What I thought would take a day of work, ended up taking over a week, working every evening, sometimes into the night. My neighbors probably thought I was nuts. I was!

Once I finished tilling the soil, I had to remove all of the old grass that I tore up. This turned out to be a very difficult task. The tiller worked the grass all over the place, sometimes 6 inches down. I basically had to sift through it and pull it out, trying to keep as much of the soil in place as possible. This step took many evenings to complete.

At this point, I was getting closer. The next step according to the instructions I was trying to follow was:

The soil should be allowed to settle after tilling or compacted slightly with the tires of a tractor or other suitable implement. Heavy rains and/or irrigation will hasten settling. Allowing the soil to settle with prevent undulations and difficult mowing in the future.

Um, let's see, I had no tractor, no time to wait for rain (guess I probably could have irrigated, but I wanted to plant that day). In the end, I used a piece of peg board and stomped on it over all of the soil. Surprisingly, it looked pretty good, but will it end up even? I guess we'll see. And now, my neighbors officially knew I was nuts - really, who jumps on their lawn?

Next I raked it over and made it look even nicer. At this point, I was pretty happy with how it all had turned out. Now it was time to seed it. But uh oh, what seed should I use? I was no expert, but had researched a little and knew that Bluegrass is the type of grass that I like, so I went to the store and bought a bag of Scotts Bluegrass mix:

Scotts Kentucky Bluegrass Mix

29.43% Abbey Kentucky Bluegrass
13.26% Courtyard Kentucky Bluegrass
5.05% Thermal Blue Kentucky Bluegrass
50% Water Smart Coating

In hindsight, doing more grass seed research would have been beneficial. There are many varieties of bluegrass grass, some better and more advanced than others. While the kind I used will probably be just fine, I also probably could have done better. The National Turfgrass Evaluation Program is a great resource for researching different varieties for various locations. I'm still baffled by all of the different types.

For mulch, I also purchased a bag of GreenView Grass Seed Accelerator:

GreenView Grass Seed Accelerator

0.7 - 1.1 - 0.4

With these two products, I made two mistakes:

1. I didn't plant enough seed
2. Since the mulch had fertilizer in it, I didn't fertilize

The seeding rate was probably the biggest mistake because I only put down about half of the bag of seed (approximately 1.5 lbs). What threw me off is the 50% coating. The experts said to put down 1.5-2 lbs of seed per 1000 sq. ft. Since I was working with roughly 1000 sq. ft., I figured half the bag would be about right. Well, I forgot that half of the bag was actually the coating on the seeds! So, instead of putting about 1.5 lbs. or so down, I only put roughly half that. Unfortunately, I didn't realize this until several weeks later when the grass started to germinate and I noticed that it looked rather thin. As soon as I could, I planted the rest of the bag hoping it would have enough time to become established before winter.

The second mistake I made was to use the mulch as the fertilizer. I failed to actually look at the bag and see how much fertilizer it had in it: 0.7-1.1-0.4 - not much at all; certainly nowhere close to the recommended 1.5 lb of Phosphorus per 1000 sq. ft. So, essentially, I didn't fertilize. This may or may not have been a big issue because I didn't do a soil test.

This is what it looked like after it was all said and "done" (with half the seed on at the time of this photo):

September 11, 2010 : After the seed was planted and the first watering.

I watered as frequently as I could, which ended up being two times a day: once in the morning and once in the evening. Eventually, after about 2 weeks, the grass started to grow. It grew very slowly and never very tall. I know that bluegrass is not very quick to establish, but I wonder if it could also have been impacted by not having much Phosphorus, or some other factor.

As soon as the first blades were roughly 2" tall, I followed the instructions to mow at 1.5" for the first few times. It was strange to be stepping on the grass when it was so new, but it seemed to be ok. It never grew much taller than that, though. After about 4 weeks, I applied about 0.75 Nitrogen and then again 8 weeks after germination. Thankfully, temperatures stayed fairly warm late into the fall giving more time for the grass to grow. Also, after about three weeks of twice daily waterings, I caved in and called someone out to take a look at the irrigation system to see how much it would take to get it working. Several hundred dollars later, I was a very happy man.

After a much needed winter's rest (for me!), here is how it looks now:

March 2010

This is only showing the top left side of the before photo and from a different angle - not the greatest before/after sequence, but it shows that something grew there - it wasn't a complete flop!

However, there are still several potential issues to contend with:

1. It still isn't very thick and in some places, particularly near the edges of the existing grass, there are even bare spots.
2. It is still pretty short, and the edge of the existing grass is very evident since it's much taller.
3. There are quite a number of weeds.

It'll be interesting to see what happens once it starts growing again this spring when temperatures get warmer. Will it fill in and thicken up? Will it grow taller? Will it grow at a comparable speed to the existing grass? Will the weeds be overcome? We'll see.

I'll have another post on the weed problem soon.