I grew a TF lawn from seed a year ago and it did great. My soil was rock solid clay when I started, but after a lot of pick axing and mixing roughly 30% compost, it's pretty good soil now. It gets up to 115 in the summer here, so the usual statement of "only water once per week with 1" of water" does not apply to the desert. I have to water mine roughly 3 times per week, and roughly 1.5-2" of water total per week.

Keep overseeding and amending the soil to get it soft. You may have to put the water on a timer to water more often.

Lawns here need watered just about every day because it is so dry and with sand soil the water just dissapears into thin air literally.

There is a relatively new variety of buffalo grass available in California. It is called UC Verde. Don't know the cost but it seems to be worth it. Once it is established it is completely no-hassle. Check out this link for pictures of Verde.

Jordanz and texas-weed, I tip my hat to you for even trying to have a lawn in the true desert! (My dad lived in Youngtown, AZ for a short time and his lawn was rocks).

Dchall, I breathed a sigh of relief when I read your response! Maybe there is hope after all! bpgreen (from Utah) is technically a neighbor of us (Idaho) and I see that he also responded so I will be sending him a message.

Thanks again all!

I usually water 3 times a year: early July, late July and mid August. Most of my neighbors water every day.

I originally wanted to use a strictly native lawn, but over time, I decided to include "naturalized" turf options (note that I didn't limit it to grasses).

First a few comments about the Intermountain West. Most (almost all) of our precipitation comes as snow. What rain we get is usually mixed with snow. We get about 2-3 inches of precipitation during the summer.

Here are the options for a low maintenance lawn (note that all of these lawns should be mowed high and should get little or no fertilizer):

Warm season natives. Buffalo grass and blue grama. Buffalo grass should be grown from sod or plugs (seed is available, but seeded varieties aren't as good). Blue Grama can be bought as plugs, but it's a bunch grass, so it won't spread well. Blue grama and buffalo grass are often planted together.

The advantages of these two grasses are that they'll stay green in the hottest part of the summer with little or no input. The disadvantage is that they'll probably be dormant from early October until mid May.

Cool season grasses:

Western wheatgrass, Streambank wheatgrass, crested wheatgrass, sheep fescue.

Western wheatgrass is a cool season grass, but it likes conditions a little warmer than most other cool season grasses. It's sort of a grey-green, but looks pretty nice I think. It's harder to establish than the other options.

Streambank wheatgrass (thickspike wheatgrass if you have sandy soil) will green up faster than western wheatgrass. It seems to go dormant faster than Western wheatgrass, but snaps out of it faster).

Crested Wheatgrass was introduced from Siberia. Most varieties are bunch grasses, but newer varieties will spread to some extent.

Sheep fescue can get by on the least amount of water, but it tends to go dormant in the heat. If you make your own mix, use Covar.

Other than grass:
clover, either Dutch white or strawberry. Dutch white is better adapted to drought, but strawberry is better with high pH. I chose Palestine strawberry clover).

My recommendation would be to get the Cabin mix from Utah seeds and augment it with strawberry clover.

Mow it at 3-4 inches. If you do no maintenance at all, it will live, but it will be dormant during the summer. If you water it once or twice a month, it will stay green all year.

Streambank wheatgrass

Crested wheatgrass

Sheep fescue

Blue grama

Strawberry clover

Buffalo grass

Many of the photos show the grasses with seed heads. If you mow you'll never see those. The huge point is that you can have an excellent lawn in the high desert without the hassle of the elite grasses you see in the advertising. There is a plugged form of buffalo called Tech Turf. Search this forum for discussions about that grass. granburyflowergirl has had it for almost a year and makes a pretty effective sales pitch for it. I'm a huge proponent, also. It is expensive to install but then it is hands off. I must have FULL sun, though.

I should also point out that although I recommended the cabin mix, I didn't use it myself. I bought individual seeds from various vendors and planted my own mixture, but the cabin mix is pre mixed, so it makes it a lot easier and it's a good selection of seeds (I think).

If you decide to use Buffalo grass, I would strongly recommend using a sodded or plugged variety rather than a seeded one, especially if you have any allergies. Even if you don't have allergies, the sodded/plugged varieties tend to make a better lawn. Blue grama is available in plugs, and is often mixed with buffalo grass, but I think I'd use seeds for blue grama, since it doesn't spread.

I opted against the buffalo/grama approach because the lawn would have been dormant too long for my tastes. But it would probably require the least maintenance of any of the choices.