On Sat, 26 Apr 2003 04:39:25 GMT, "New Farmer"
wrote:

Hey Folks,

I know this has been asked before and I've read all the posts. Its left me
rather confused, so I want to see if I can clear this up.........................................
snip..............................
So whats the best way of getting the yard back in shape? This is what I've
heard from numerous sources:

1. "Keep watering deep every five days and st. augustine will take over."
Will this really happen? If yes, how long will it take? I dont care much if
its mixed augstine and bermuda as long as its green.

If you don't care if it's a mixed lawn just start watering and let it
fill in, fertilize, mulch etc as needed, use sprigs of S.A or Bermuda
to fill in serious bare spots.

2. "Till the grass in (no need to kill it all). Rake. Sod": This will
probably work, but its expensive.

If you till without killing the existing lawn you will get bermuda for
sure and probably SA coming up through the sod

3. "Till the grass in, rake it. Sod with a 1 foot spacing between sod
squares". How long will this take to cover the whole yard?

Again if you don't kill the existing lawn this is even easier for the
bermuda to come back, this also allows other weeds to germinate. This
method has most of the disadvantages of sod and seed

4. "Get some runners from other places in the yard and plant those in the
dead areas". Again, how long will the grass take to establish and how do you
really plant runners? Under the ground, over the ground..prepartion?

See #1 - Rake out some runners chop them into sprigs (pieces with 2 or 3
nodes), prepare the soil, scatter the sprigs, roll, treat like seeds for
a while, will take about the same time as seed

5. "Just put a layer of dirt on top and keep watering. augustine will send
runners and grow by itself with adequate watering".

So will the bermuda
This is basically # 1 again, I would use some kind of mulch or a
mulch/soil top dressing, whatever is popular in your area

Then I've also read a host of different things like use round up to kill
first before doing other stuff, to get soil tests, to put new dirt etc etc.
Obviously, I am looking for an option thats balanced between expense,
effort, and time to establishment.

If you want a golf course do all of the soil tests etc. Around here
Bermuda grows in anything, I have less experience with SA but the one
place I had it in my yard it came back quickly when I started watering
it, this was a place that had been abandoned for a couple of years and
the SA was just hanging on.

Any folks out there who've done this or have experience, please write back.

I don't have the earlier thread, where in the world are you, is Kikuyu
grass used in your area? My "lawn" (more of a meadow) is a mixture of
bermuda, Kikuyu, hybrid tall fescue and bluegrass It looks fine to me. I
water a couple of times a week have it mowed once a week and the only
fertilizer is over spray from the flower beds. I don't stress out over
my lawn, it is mostly there to keep the soil in place until I figure out
how and when I can incorporate it into the ornamental beds, I have
eliminated about half of the existing lawn in the 6 years I've been here
and what is left is pathway to different areas of the yard

--
Garrapata
Prunedale, California .............36.81377 N, 121.65508 W
USDA Zone 9..Sunset Zone 15..Near Monterey Bay and Elkhorn Slough