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| I bought a house and the lawn was untouched for a year. When I moved in, the front yard was covered with weed and a few crab grass. There was barely any grass left, only 30% of the land is covered with grass and a few patches here and there existed. The sides of the house was okay since it is shared with the neighbors so their grass is shared with ours. The backyard is a disaster. there is a lot of crab grass in the way and only 10-30% grass exists in it. The rest is covered with weeds and same with the front yard. The drought killed the grass and the weed took over. There are dry dead patches here and there too.
The only treatment I did to it is I bought weed and feed to kill the weed, which it did but the weed regrew, but it is better than before. The irrigation system is broken in the front yard because of a busted pipe but the backyard still works and it waters the backyard for 10 minutes everyday at night. I was hoping the existing grass would spread through out the yard, but it seems that it didn't much. What should I do? The type of grass that still exists is St Augustine. I want my yard to look good with the cheapest way possible. I don't care if it means killing my grass for new grass or mixing it with something else, just want the cheapest way to make it look good. |
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| BTW, I have lived in this house for 2 years, I just want to fix it now, I never really tried doing anything to it when I bought the house, until now. The weed and feed was added in 2 months ago. |
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- Posted by botanicalbill 9b SWFlorida (My Page) on Sun, May 15, 11 at 23:56
| So what you are saying is about 80% of your lawn is weeds and or bare spots. I would buy a bottle of glyphosate (roundup) and spray the yard. Let it die, in a week, spray it again. Wait a few weeks. if you see any weeds come up, spray them. You will have to wait at least 2 weeks before sodding or planing a yard. If you have an irrigation system, put in St Aug. If no irrigation system, sod with bahia. This is the cheapest way to go. Benefits of St Aug is it spreads extremely fast cons of st Aug, handles little traffic and most weed killers kill st aug. Benefits of Bahia, cheap and does not require irrigation or fertilizer, you can use about 5 weed killers, handles moderate traffic. Cons of bahia, it thins out if you do not re-seed every 3 years or so. |
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- Posted by dchall_san_antonio 8 San Antonio (My Page) on Mon, May 16, 11 at 0:24
| Stop watering every day. Back off until you are watering only once a week this time of year. When it cools off, continue to back off until you are watering once a month during the cooler seasons. By watering every day you are keeping the weed seeds moist enough to germinate. If you stop watering every day, those weed seeds will not germinate. When you back off on watering you will have to water longer. I live in San Antonio in a very shady neighborhood. I water once a week for 3-5 hours per zone. This recent rain helped but if the drought continues, I'll have to go to 7 hours per zone. How long you water depends on your sprinklers, water pressure, grass type, soil type and structure, cloud cover, humidity, trees, wind, etc. Daily watering is possibly the worst thing you can do to a southern lawn. Get some tuna or cat food cans and time how long it takes to fill one. That is your starting point for watering. Then watch the grass to determine if it needs water before a week is up. At first it will because your lawn has short little roots. With the deep watering, the roots will lengthen. Don't use any more weed n feed products. If you have to kill weeds, get liquid Weed-B-Gone and spot spray individual weeds. You don't have to saturate the plant and soil. All you have to do is moisten the leaves. But 2 weeks before you kill the weeds, fertilize. If you use synthetic fertilizers (like Scott's), then fertilize on Memorial Day and take the rest of the summer off from fertilizing. If you want to use organic fertilizer, you can do that any time of day or year, including in the heat of summer. You may not be mowing if the grass is not growing. Assuming you are mowing at least some, raise the mower to the highest setting. St Aug can go up to 30 inches with no trouble. Tall St Aug performs better, uses less water, and keeps weeds out the best. 3 inches is minimum and 4-6 is ideal. |
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- Posted by nearandwest 7 (My Page) on Mon, May 16, 11 at 10:03
| "St Aug can go up to 30 inches with no trouble." Lol...I'll assume this is a typo. But maybe someone will try it. |
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- Posted by dchall_san_antonio 8 San Antonio (My Page) on Mon, May 16, 11 at 10:22
| Not a typo. This is a photo taken of St Augustine that has escaped into the wild. The wild is a sand dune adjacent to the condo we have on Mustang Island, TX. The grass was planted in the late 1980s and has grown out as you can see into the dunes. This area is the 'dog walk' area and has never been fertilized or watered. It easily looks better than the areas where they fertilize and water, but nobody seems to notice that. The St Aug stopped growing at 30 inches high. The photo was taken in 2007.
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- Posted by nearandwest 7 (My Page) on Mon, May 16, 11 at 11:49
| Wow! Good post and picture. Too many of us (me) are programmed that grass has to be mowed in order to look good. The photo above proves otherwise. |
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| Idk what water setting to put in the sprinkler system now. I think I will actually stop watering the backyard for good because 80% of the yard just has this thin grass type weed, crab grass, weeds, and ugly stuff like that. I thought the St. Augustine grass that is still existing on the perimeter of the yard, will spread evenly, but it barely spreads. I do not live in a shady neighborhood. The trees are small, the area was a brand new neighborhood 5 years ago. There are barely any trees and the sun shines on most of the yard. How many inches of water should St. Augustine grass get per week and also, I have a small garden that has tomato and basil plants right now, which need water everyday, but I guess I can water them individually. My front yard doesn't have St. Augustine grass, I don't know what it is. I actually don't really have much St. Augustine grass left, just some around the perimeter in the backyard and on one side of the house. |
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- Posted by dchall_san_antonio 8 San Antonio (My Page) on Mon, May 16, 11 at 23:46
| You'll have to experiment with the tuna cans to determine how long to water. St Aug will spread during cooler temperatures but only if the soil it is moving toward is moist. The best way to do that is to water frequently when the temps are cool. Frequently means weekly in cool weather. Normal watering would be monthly in the cool temps, so weekly is a lot. If you stop watering in the back, all the St Aug will die. How many inches per week is enough? Depends on shade, sun, heat, wind, soil, mowing height, rain, and humidity. I get by normally with 3/8 inch per week. This summer it is looking like it will be more like 5/8 inch per week. I am in pretty deep shade, though. The problem shaping up for this year is high temps and low humidity. If you want a relatively low maintenance lawn, you might look at the sod varieties of buffalo grass. The one I like is called Tech Turf by the Turffalo company north of Lubbock. I've seen several installations and am very impressed. It grows very dense and can tolerate weeks with no irrigation. The seeded varieties of buffalo always end up looking like the grass on the side of the road - pure weeds. |
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| Wow thanks. nice information. I think I will spray round up on the weeds before the St. Aug reaches that area so the weeds will be dead when the St. Aug reaches the area. I reprogrammed the irrigation system and I set it to once a week on a saturday cool temp night for 40 minutes per zone, it should be okay. Do you think the St. Augustine will spread evenly? Should I fertilize it? I used Scott's weed and feed 2 months ago, it looked like it fertilized it quite a bit. The front yard looks like it has a different grass and I can see spots of it forming in the yard. If I water the front lawn too when I get the irrigation system fixed, will the grass spread evenly? What do you think about the scott's summer fertilizer? Also one of my irrigation system's sprinkler's popped off from a winter freeze. Can I use the same type of sprinkler on it, but a different brand? Also the pipe just has a hole in it. Do you think I can cut that pipe out with the hole, put 2 unions and put a small pipe in between? What type of glue should I use for the unions? |
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