I care for my own lawn, but I thought I'd talk about my next door
neighbor's lawn in this post.

My next door neighbor has nothing in his *BACK* yard but crabgrass and
henbit. Virtually all the zoysia he had is now gone. He says, "Well, as
long as it's green...." [chuckle]

He did fix up his FRONT yard, though, which was also going to pot with a
ton of weeds--everything from foxtail to plantains to crabgrass. He paid
$500 to his weekly lawn-mowing company to use a machine to aerate his
front yard in September and plant a cool-season seed mixture, which looks
like its fescue, annual or perennial ryegrass, and maybe a bit of
bluegrass. He told me he also personally hand-sewed a whole lot of
"Canadian Green" after they aerated. His front yard is about 1,500 to
2,000 square feet.

So the zoysia he once had in *front* is now almost all gone, replaced by
the tons of weeds and the newly planted cool season grasses. But of
course as I mentioned earlier, his *back* yard is nothing but crabgrass
and henbit.

You'd think for $500 the company could have done both his back and front
yards, which probably total about 3,000 square feet. But all they did was
his front yard. Oh well. He's a good customer too. He let's them cut his
lawn every single week whether it needs it or not. And they always cut it
way too low. Maybe I should talk to him about it, but I haven't.

My other neighbor also gets his lawn cut weekly, but by a different
company, yet this company also cuts his lawn way too low. After every
cut, Neighbor Number 2's zoysia lawn looks brownish, having had much of
the green cut too low. I don't understand why these lawn companies do
that. I haven't uttered a word about it to either neighbor though. I
don't want to meddle, I guess.

ZoysiaSod wrote:...................


Sounds like the zoysia grass is really useless stuff.

On Thu, 10 Nov 2011 16:32:22 -0800, Bob F wrote:

ZoysiaSod wrote:...................


Sounds like the zoysia grass is really useless stuff.
=====

Don't be a snot. You know as well as I that any grass
(whether it's a cool-season grass or warm-season) will
suffer if it's cut too low, known as "scalping."

As the books say, cutting more than a third of the
grass blade will stunt the roots. So if your grass
is way too tall, and you want to cut half its height
or even 2/3 of its height, then cut just a third off
one day, and wait about 4 or 5 days to cut the other
third off. Otherwise, the roots will take a hit.

Although roughly 10 percent of my lawn is fescue--I have
an area in the back yard that is nothing but fescue--I do
prefer the zoysia. Zoysia comprises 90 percent of
my lawn. I enjoy both grasses (and even planted a
bit of creeping red fescue and perennial ryegrass
in September in addition to the 10 pieces of
zoysia sod and plugs I planted earlier in the season),
but I gotta say
I prefer zoysia simply because I think it's a little
more convenient for me in the Transition Zone of
St. Louis. The zoysia doesn't seem to need as much
water in the summer as the fescue and doesn't grow
vertically so fast, although in the heat of the summer,
the zoysia will definitely outpace the fescue in
vertical growth. Both are good grasses though.

Oops, I posted the above message as "Bumpers" but it's
me: ZoysiaSod.

This reminds me. I read in a book to write down the
grass you planted and its variety name so you have
a record of it for future reference.

The printed names on the back of my bag of Scotts
Turf Builder grass seed (Sun and Shade Mix) is
already fading. I can barely read the names anymore,
so for future reference:

Fenway Creeping Red Fescue
Wendy Jean Creeping Red Fescue

Uno Perennial Ryegrass
Silver Dollar Perennial Ryegrass

Wildhorse Kentucky Bluegrass
Abbey Kentucky Bluegrass

The percentage of each above is roughly equal.

Other ingredients in the bag a

0.50 percent Other Crop Seed (I wonder what those crops are?)

50 percent Water Smart Coating (don't eat this seed--chuckle)

1.75 percent Inert Matter (what could this be--all I see is
seed in the bag)

0.01 percent Weed Seed (very nice, low percentage)

Noxious Weed Seeds: None Found.

I can't read the seeds' places of origin anymore (totally
faded), but I think I remember that the seeds came from
Washington State and Oregon.

On Nov 10, 5:42*am, ZoysiaSod wrote:
I care for my own lawn, but I thought I'd talk about my next door
neighbor's lawn in this post.

My next door neighbor has nothing in his *BACK* yard but crabgrass and
henbit. Virtually all the zoysia he had is now gone. He says, "Well, as
long as it's green...." [chuckle]



How did the Zoysia just go away? Zoysia is one tough grass and it
takes over everything. I';ve even seen it start to crack asphalt
driveways.
I've heard of lots of people ****ed because it's spreading and taking
over
there lawn, but never anyone complaining about it disappearing.




He did fix up his FRONT yard, though, which was also going to pot with a
ton of weeds--everything from foxtail to plantains to crabgrass. He paid
$500 to his weekly lawn-mowing company to use a machine to aerate his
front yard in September and plant a cool-season seed mixture, which looks
like its fescue, annual or perennial ryegrass, and maybe a bit of
bluegrass. He told me he also personally hand-sewed a whole lot of
"Canadian Green" after they aerated. His front yard is about 1,500 to
2,000 square feet.

So the zoysia he once had in *front* is now almost all gone, replaced by
the tons of weeds and the newly planted cool season grasses.

The zoysia will soon finish off what's there and the newly seeded
grass
will just get crowded out.



But of
course as I mentioned earlier, his *back* yard is nothing but crabgrass
and henbit.

You'd think for $500 the company could have done both his back and front
yards, which probably total about 3,000 square feet. But all they did was
his front yard. Oh well. He's a good customer too. He let's them cut his
lawn every single week whether it needs it or not. And they always cut it
way too low. Maybe I should talk to him about it, but I haven't.

My other neighbor also gets his lawn cut weekly, but by a different
company, yet this company also cuts his lawn way too low. After every
cut, Neighbor Number 2's zoysia lawn looks brownish, having had much of
the green cut too low. I don't understand why these lawn companies do
that. I haven't uttered a word about it to either neighbor though. I
don't want to meddle, I guess.

wrote:

How did the Zoysia just go away? Zoysia is one tough grass
and it takes over everything. I';ve even seen it start to
crack asphalt driveways.

I've heard of lots of people ****ed because it's spreading
and taking over there lawn, but never anyone complaining about
it disappearing.
=====

He used to have a really tall tree in the front yard which he
removed a couple years ago, including the stump and maybe even
some of the roots. I didn't see the removal process to say
exactly what happened, but he was left with a large bare area
in the front yard where the big tree used to be. He also said
his son-in-law accidentally killed a lot of other zoysia when he
did some yard work by leaving debris covered the zoysia for
days or weeks. Plus St. Louis saw a drought this summer
combined with its hottest July since about 1932, and
he was on vacation for a long time during this extended period
of drought and super heat.

No one watered the zoysia even a little to just keep the
crowns alive. Same thing happened to
a couple other people. Had I known what the devastating result
would be, I would have watered his zoysia myself from my own hose.
Oh well, St. Louis hadn't seen this kind of heat since 1932 or so.

Anyway, I guess for these reasons and others he lost a lot of
zoysia the past 2 or 3 years. I do hope you're right, and the
remaining zoysia makes a comeback in his yard. He's got so
many weeds in front and back.

He's got some super-duper shiny, bright green blades in his yard.
I gotta wonder if that's annual ryegrass instead of perennial
ryegrass. He did sew some so-called "Canadian Green" himself
after the lawn-mowing company aerated and sewed a mixture of
what must be fine fescue(s) and ryegrass(es). I hope they used
perennial rye but not sure. I bet there was some annual rye
in that Canadian Green he used, and he said he used a lot of
Canadian Green.

His back yard is a total loss: nothing but huge swaths of
crabgrass and a whole lot of henbit everywhere. Almost no
grass in back at all. His backyard weeds butt up against
my zoysia, though, so hopefully, with the passage of years,
my zoysia will spread into his backyard and help it out.

I also hope his weeds don't invade my zoysia. I hope you're
right and the zoysia wins over the weeds. That's what the
books seem to say, but I dunno if that's always the case for
sure.

How does purple nutsedge fare against zoysia?

This reminds me. I read in a book to write down the grass you planted and its variety name so you have a record of it for future reference. The printed names on the back of my bag of Scotts Turf Builder grass seed (Sun and Shade Mix) is already fading. I can barely read the names anymore, so for future reference: Fenway Creeping Red Fescue Wendy Jean Creeping Red Fescue Uno Perennial Ryegrass ...