Soil Test for new yard

Learn how improving your soil can lead to a better looking lawn
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killachinchilla
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Soil Test for new yard

Post by killachinchilla » June 4th, 2020, 10:37 am

Thanks for your help and recommendations for my new yard. Below are some of the details to shed some light for yal!

The yard is almost 13k square feet.
It was hydro mulched with fetura bermuda about a month ago and is coming in nicely.
The soil test was taken at 4 inches in depth.
I try to stick with the a lb of nitrogen per 1k every month but open to suggestions.



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MorpheusPA
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Re: Soil Test for new yard

Post by MorpheusPA » June 5th, 2020, 8:53 pm

Next time, just get the basic test, I'm using that for most of my answers below. My take on these things are a little different from others so if you find what I'm saying opaque or confusing, please ask. I tend to be a bit long-winded to make sure you understand what you paid for, and that you know what's going on in your lawn. Some people don't care. Recommendations are at the bottom if you seriously don't care about anything except what to add. :-)

ME 27: This is inflated by the calcium levels in your soil, but I don't think there's too much doubt that you do have a heavier soil to begin with. What, exactly, is hard to say. You could do a jar test, but it would need to be done with vinegar, so if you do, don't put the lid on or the jar will explode. I'm going to mentally adjust this down to an ME of 15 for the purposes of working with your soil, but other readers might argue with that and there's plenty of latitude for argument on that point.
pH 8.2: High. It's not a barrier to a good lawn, although the deepest green hues will be difficult to achieve without spraying iron. Constantly. I wouldn't bother, if I were you. Grasses will grow fine in this, however, given what it's being caused by, which I talk about below. There are ways to generate high pH (pH alone doesn't actually tell you much) that can kill a lawn, but yours isn't caused that way, and so far I haven't seen many where that's the case.
OM 1.56%: Quite low. Given your very high pH, I'd like to see this go as high as possible, too. Because this is a new yard, low is not entirely unexpected! Always much mow your Bermuda, and feed it well (that 1 pound N per month is great). Feed organically if you want, either as that 1 pound, or in addition to it, and mulch mow any leaves you get. You can bring in leaves if you can get them, too. I'm good with any source of organics you want to use, really. Increasing OM will make your pH and the problems it can cause matter a bit less, and give the resources a few more places to bind and become available to the lawn (and your gardens, if any).
Sulfur 60: Entirely normal.

Phosphorus 50: Low, and at your pH, I'm just going to call this deficient. P doesn't unbind easily too far off a pH of about 6.5 or so (hence why it's the optimal garden and lawn pH), although small amounts will. You're pretty much stuck with your pH for the long-term, although adding organic matter will make it matter a bit less. For this, we use off the shelf Starter Fertilizer (any brand. Lesco and Vigoro tend to be fairly cheap for what you get). I made some recommendations below to start.

Calcium 88%: Yep, that's where some of the high pH is coming from, and the excess ME. It's actually sitting around in the soil as limestone. It's not a problem, but please avoid major sources of calcium--so no limestone. No calcium limestone. No calcite. Nothing like that. Minor things, like "contains 1% calcium" isn't going to be a problem in most cases.
Magnesium 5.4%: While it looks a bit low, I'm mentally doubling these numbers (well, not really, I'm doing more gymnastics than that). It's OK, it's just depressed considerably by the high calcium. Your plants can get the magnesium they need. None is required, and you should also avoid magnesium sources. No limestone, Epsom salt, dolomite, etc. But again, something with an incidental amount of magnesium isn't a problem.
Potassium 2.3%: Again, it's OK, just depressed by the calcium, and even the depressed number is within the OK range. Now that I'm back, people will readjust to the fact that I like higher K numbers, but in this case, there's no reason (or ability) to do that here. Your plants don't need the excess, and you don't have to avoid potassium sources. Soils just aren't that touchy in terms of potassium.

Sodium 0.89%: This is a little higher than I like to see. If you have softened water, turn off the softener before watering the lawn--always. It's cheaper to do that anyway. It's not really a problem, though. Make sure, when irrigating the lawn, to water deeply and infrequently to drive the sodium that's in the soil down deep below the root systems so it doesn't show up again. If it does continue to build up, there are ways to get rid of it, but they're not something we really want to do in your lawn.

Micronutrients: These are not my forte, except for boron and iron and...OK, except for zinc and copper and manganese in some cases.
Boron 0.83: Geez, perfect. A whisper on the high side, but that's all to the good at a high pH anyway.
Iron 33: Very low, but iron isn't going to be available at your pH. Over time, I'd add some iron using Milorganite and other sources as you stumble across them at the store cheaply and on sale, but don't go crazy and don't hope for much. Iron availability at a pH of 8+ is horrible, and never will be good. For good color...you're probably going to have to spray iron, which is tedious, time-consuming, and...well, I wouldn't bother. Even chelated iron isn't going to work well at that pH. If, over time, you can push that to 1000+ PPM, you might manage halfway decent color just from soil iron. That will take years, if not decades.
Manganese 80: Fine. Manganese counters iron, so this is also fighting you on color (iron should be greater than manganese, which is the one thing I would correct regarding iron).
Zinc, Copper: I'd like Andy or another micro specialist (I've been gone for a while) to read these. You absolutely need zinc, which will be zinc sulfate, and I'm 99% sure you need copper (copper sulfate), but I'm hesitant to call the final amounts. I do the math in my head and with your pH, my head is returning numbers that just don't make sense.

Recommendations:

July 1: Feed your Bermuda lawn with starter fertilizer at bag rate.
August 1: Feed your Bermuda lawn with starter fertilizer at bag rate.
September 1: Feed your Bermuda lawn with starter fertilizer at bag rate.

June 1, 2021: Feed your Bermuda lawn with starter fertilizer at bag rate.

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andy10917
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Re: Soil Test for new yard

Post by andy10917 » June 6th, 2020, 8:29 am

Wow! That Zinc number is below the threshold of the soil testing. That's pretty unusual. Get some Zinc Sulfate form Amazon/EBay and apply it monthly at 3 tablespoons/K as outlined in the Micronutrient Application Guide. Let's leave the Copper alone for now.

killachinchilla
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Re: Soil Test for new yard

Post by killachinchilla » June 6th, 2020, 3:31 pm

Thank y’all for the info. I will continue with starter fertilizer and start zinc sulfate! What would product would y’all recommend for iron?

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MorpheusPA
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Re: Soil Test for new yard

Post by MorpheusPA » June 6th, 2020, 4:11 pm

Milorganite, to kill three and a half stones with one bird. Since we're looking to add phosphorus, nitrogen, organic matter, and iron, if you want to partially replace the starter fertilizer with bag rate to 1.2 times bag rate of Milorgante above, please feel free.
Milorganite is an organic fertilizer* with about six percent nitrogen, two percent phosphorus, less than one percent potassium, and about 2.5% iron.
It's a little low in terms of phosphorus from what I was thinking, so let's revise the schedule a bit. Also, it's going to be more expensive than what I had on the plan, but far less than adding a chemical source of iron or non-combined source of everything else, so... Don't feel you need to need to follow this hybrid plan over the one above, you can revert to just the starter.

Revised Recommendations with Milorganite:

July 1: Feed your Bermuda lawn with Milorganite at 1.0 to 1.2 times bag rate.
August 1: Feed your Bermuda lawn with starter fertilizer at bag rate.
September 1: Feed your Bermuda lawn with Milorganite at 1.0 to 1.2 times bag rate.

June 1, 2021: Feed your Bermuda lawn with starter fertilizer at bag rate.

...And so on, but you'd normally get a soil test next June again.



* You're going to encounter some argument about this, but it's kilned bacteria from the sewage plant. Definitely organic matter. There's some fast nitrogen in it.


killachinchilla
Posts: 22
Joined: June 3rd, 2016, 1:09 pm
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Re: Soil Test for new yard

Post by killachinchilla » June 7th, 2020, 9:25 am

In the past I have rotated starter fertilizer and milogranite every two weeks on my last lawn. Is there anything wrong with doing that again for a little extra help?

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MorpheusPA
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Re: Soil Test for new yard

Post by MorpheusPA » June 7th, 2020, 9:59 am

None whatsoever if your budget will allow this.

Go with about 2/3 bag rate on the starter fertilizer and bag rate (which is about 2/3 normal nitrogen rate for a lawn) on the Milorganite and you'll be doing very well indeed.

Even full bag rate on starter will be fine as it targets nitrogen on the low side anyway--about 75%--but if you start to see any signs of burning, cut back the starter.

killachinchilla
Posts: 22
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Re: Soil Test for new yard

Post by killachinchilla » June 7th, 2020, 11:55 am

Appreciate the help!!!

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MorpheusPA
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Re: Soil Test for new yard

Post by MorpheusPA » June 7th, 2020, 1:30 pm

De nada. Always feel free to ask if you have any other questions at all, even if they seem repetitive or silly. I assure you, they are neither and we'll be happy to help.

killachinchilla
Posts: 22
Joined: June 3rd, 2016, 1:09 pm
Location: DFW
Grass Type: Bermuda
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Re: Soil Test for new yard

Post by killachinchilla » June 8th, 2020, 10:06 am

Would Ironite be an option to get a little more iron?

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MorpheusPA
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Re: Soil Test for new yard

Post by MorpheusPA » June 8th, 2020, 3:32 pm

Which one? :-)

The shorter answer is yes...but it's an option I'm a little less comfortable with. Most of that is just me, however, and if you use it two, three times a year for the next few years you're not going to have a problem.

The main one contains about 4.5% iron--around double Milo--but contains no organic matter and doesn't appreciably feed the lawn. The iron here is going to be less available to the lawn than Milo's (there's no organic matter buffering it at all, so your pH is going to bind it almost instantly, as opposed to the 0.01 seconds the Milo's iron has before it binds).

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