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Sun, Jul 10, 11 at 22:41
| I had a nice KBG lawn at my previous house that I started from scratch. It had selected some very nice KBG varieties and it turned out great. It was a lot of work to maintain, expensive to water and expensive to fertilize.
Now we've moved and this yard is a mess. I would like to kill everything and start over, but with something that requires very little maintenance and shade tolerant. The lawn area is not very large (maybe 10000 sqft), but is surrounded by mature trees. It also has to be somewhat kid-tolerant too... Anyone have any recommendations for grass seed varieties or at least point me in the right direction? I am in southern NH. Thanks! |
Follow-Up Postings:
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| I would probably steer you towards using fine fescues. 10,000 square feet is not what I would call "not very large" but I guess it's smaller than a few acres. Fine fescues (creeping red, hard, chewings, sheep) require less water, fertilizer, and sun than all the other cool season grasses (well not all, but we'll neglect to talk about the specialty grasses), but they aren't the most traffic tolerant. Sure they can handle kids running around a bit, but not repeated touch football games. The creeping red's have some spreading ability, but it's slow, nothing like Kentucky bluegrass. I have heard a lot of good things about Bonny Dunes fine fescue blend, but it has a low percentage of creeping red fescue. If you want to have a large percentage of creeping red, you should take a look at the NTEP ratings ( http://www.ntep.org/data/ff03/ff03_08-9f/ff03_08-9f.pdf )to see which ones do the best in your area. Then you can order the better performers from a seed seller. Most of the shade mixes in the big box stores are terribly thought out and contain lousy cultivars, I would avoid them. |
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| I agree with tiemco. Fine fescues are probably your best bet. Make sure you get mixtures that have named cultivars. Boreal Creeping red fescue looks like a named cultivar, but it's an unimproved variety. And VNS means Variety Not Stated, so avoid that, as well. |
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| Thanks for the input! I was considering fine fescues....seems like the better option. I also did read quite a few positive things about the Bonny Dunes mix. The lawn is shaped like a narrow rectangle. The center gets sun, but with over 8 acres of mature trees, there's no way the edges will get much sunlight. The lawn also gets a variety of pests (chipmunks, voles,...) and a significant downpour of acorns in the Fall. It's a challenge. |
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