Gryd's 2014 Front Yard Renovation Take 2

Discuss how to and whether you should renovate your lawn
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Jackpine
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Re: Gryd's 2014 Front Yard Renovation Take 2

Post by Jackpine » August 14th, 2014, 9:28 pm

Take a shower Greg!

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gryd
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Re: Gryd's 2014 Front Yard Renovation Take 2

Post by gryd » August 14th, 2014, 10:03 pm

Othertime wrote:How many bales did you end up manning up to today?
Ten bales. Some were the 3.8 cubic feet bags. I stopped at 8 pm when it was too dark to accomplish anything. I'd say I finished top dressing 3/4 of the yard. I still have 6 bales of peat left. I'll finish that tomorrow then roll again then work on my 2 shady areas. There is a chance I finish up tomorrow, albeit slim.

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gryd
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Re: Gryd's 2014 Front Yard Renovation Take 2

Post by gryd » August 14th, 2014, 10:04 pm

Jackpine wrote:Take a shower Greg!
Why? I'll just get dirty again! :confused:

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HoosierLawnGnome
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Re: Gryd's 2014 Front Yard Renovation Take 2

Post by HoosierLawnGnome » August 14th, 2014, 11:37 pm

Congrats on seed down!!!!! :yahoo:

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Re: Gryd's 2014 Front Yard Renovation Take 2

Post by gryd » August 15th, 2014, 11:14 am

HoosierLawnGnome wrote:Congrats on seed down!!!!! :yahoo:
Thanks! I'm back! It's 11 an eastern time. Family obligations prevented me from starting earlier. Plan is to finish topdressing and move on and seed those shady areas with my shadier blend: Bewitched, Moonlight SLT and Blue Velvet but heavy on the Bewitched. I even have a couple spots where some fescue is required. I have some Firefly Hard and Fortitude Creeping Red for that. I could use tall as I have 3 pounds of the Little League Blend from Pawnee Butte. All good cultivars. Problem with the tall is if it gets washed into the KBG its more noticeable than the fine. I like Tall better though. Any thoughts anyone?


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gryd
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Re: Gryd's 2014 Front Yard Renovation Take 2

Post by gryd » August 15th, 2014, 3:15 pm

The main course is done! :yahoo: I call it the Prosperity Blend because there is ten percent more Prosperity than any other cultivar. For the record here is the blend: Prosperity (34%)' Moonlight SLT (23.5%), Midnight (21%), Blue Velvet (11.5%), Bewitched (10%). Talk about over thinking our seed choices. Greenbum, maybe my blend will work for you?

I was/am looking for a dark blend with lots of blue. Color was obviously important to me because I'm a member of our elite faction of members who killed off their beautiful elite bluegrass lawns to change the color (the extra crazy ones).

Anyway, I needed to order more seed at one point so I went with Blue Velvet instead of more Midnight for the blue tone. I guess there is a little blue in Midnight but according to the BTEP (Barley) the 2 bluest cultivars over time were Prosperity and Blue Velvet. He did not have good luck with Moonlight SLT but I have it here and it's pretty much the same dark blue color as the small area of Moonbeam that I have. So that's how I came to this particular blend and I added Bewitched for disease resistance and sparkle (I have it here and it's lighter than Moonlight SLT but a real nice green). Enough rambling. How about some pictures of yesterday's and today's work!

Image


Image


Image

Not bad for an AARP eligible person!

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Othertime
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Re: Gryd's 2014 Front Yard Renovation Take 2

Post by Othertime » August 15th, 2014, 3:56 pm

Sweet!! Good luck on get it up. :rotfl:

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Jackpine
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Re: Gryd's 2014 Front Yard Renovation Take 2

Post by Jackpine » August 15th, 2014, 4:33 pm

Nice job!

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gryd
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Re: Gryd's 2014 Front Yard Renovation Take 2

Post by gryd » August 15th, 2014, 4:54 pm

Othertime wrote:Sweet!! Good luck on get it up. :rotfl:
I'm too old for anything but lawn renovations and sleep :rotfl:

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Re: Gryd's 2014 Front Yard Renovation Take 2

Post by gryd » August 15th, 2014, 4:55 pm

Jackpine wrote:Nice job!
Thanks! Gonna go tackle one of the shady areas now.

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ken-n-nancy
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Re: Gryd's 2014 Front Yard Renovation Take 2

Post by ken-n-nancy » August 15th, 2014, 5:24 pm

gryd wrote:The main course is done!
Image
Wow, that looks awesome. The grading looks as flat as a table-top, with a very nice even slope. Impressive!

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Re: Gryd's 2014 Front Yard Renovation Take 2

Post by dabeevm25 » August 15th, 2014, 7:06 pm

gryd wrote:The main course is done! :yahoo: I call it the Prosperity Blend because there is ten percent more Prosperity than any other cultivar. For the record here is the blend: Prosperity (34%)' Moonlight SLT (23.5%), Midnight (21%), Blue Velvet (11.5%), Bewitched (10%). Talk about over thinking our seed choices. Greenbum, maybe my blend will work for you?

I was/am looking for a dark blend with lots of blue. Color was obviously important to me because I'm a member of our elite faction of members who killed off their beautiful elite bluegrass lawns to change the color (the extra crazy ones).

Anyway, I needed to order more seed at one point so I went with Blue Velvet instead of more Midnight for the blue tone. I guess there is a little blue in Midnight but according to the BTEP (Barley) the 2 bluest cultivars over time were Prosperity and Blue Velvet. He did not have good luck with Moonlight SLT but I have it here and it's pretty much the same dark blue color as the small area of Moonbeam that I have. So that's how I came to this particular blend and I added Bewitched for disease resistance and sparkle (I have it here and it's lighter than Moonlight SLT but a real nice green). Enough rambling. How about some pictures of yesterday's and today's work!

Image


Image


Image

Not bad for an AARP eligible person!
All that hard work is showing. That yard looks really good! Now comes the hard part of waiting patiently for germination.

I did perennial rye (what a mistake that was) in a renovation last year and had germination in a few days, so it's going to be hard for me to be patient with my new reno.

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Re: Gryd's 2014 Front Yard Renovation Take 2

Post by gryd » August 15th, 2014, 9:43 pm

Thanks guys! I still have 2 small areas to seed. By the time I added more peat moss, adjusted some sprinklers, and put up a barrier for the dog I ran out of daylight. So basically it took me 2 days to seed the large area in the pictures. Everything just seemed to take a long time!

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Re: Gryd's 2014 Front Yard Renovation - Day 3

Post by gryd » August 16th, 2014, 2:01 pm

Lol - the old man (me) is still at it. It took 2 days to complete the main section of my front yard renovation. Today I am trying to tackle 2 areas that require a shadier blend. I just finished leveling, seeding and top dressing one of the areas. Rather than use Prosperity and Midnight in these 2 areas I went with 50% Bewitched and some Moonlight SLT and Blue Velvet. The area I just did is under 2 cedar trees with landscape block for tree rings. Right behind the tree rings never gets direct light so I used a bit of fine fescue there (Firefly Hard and Fortitude Creeping Red). Then I moved out and added some Bewitched and ultimately transitioned to my shade blend of Bewitched, Moonlight SLT and Blue Velvet. What a PIA! Time for a break!

Also, my sprinkler heads are old and leaky (just like me!). The worst offenders leave tiny streams through my peat moss and these streams erode the soil around these old sprinkler heads. I broke one of the rules and used some bagged, shredded straw around these leaky heads. They really helped put an end to the erosion.

One more shady area to get to later this afternoon. This renovation is kicking my butt!

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Re: Gryd's 2014 Front Yard Renovation - Day 3

Post by HoosierLawnGnome » August 16th, 2014, 5:31 pm

Stick with it!

[ Post made via Android ] Image

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Re: Gryd's 2014 Front Yard Renovation - Day 3

Post by gryd » August 16th, 2014, 10:07 pm

HoosierLawnGnome wrote:Stick with it!

[ Post made via Android ] Image
I stuck with it and the renovation is seeded, top dressed, rolled, etc.... Now I'm trying to get that peat moss wet. Some spots look a bit dry to me.

That was a ton of work! I'm the type of person who takes his time and pays attention to every detail. A perfectionist I guess.

I lucked out on the weather though. It was unseasonably mild all week. Unfortunately I still have work to do. The shed delivery this week wrecked my walkway and left deep ruts all over the place. It was not a straight shot for the truck and the driver pretty much drove all over the place leaving his mark in many, many places. I have a couple of yards of soil to fill in the ruts. Hopefully I won't have to seed much because I no longer have the blend I used 4 years ago and they don't sell Brilliant anymore. :banghead:

Tonight, however, I'm celebrating the culmination of 3 months of planning and work to renovate my elite KBG lawn with a darker blend. I sure hope I used the right blend this time! :o

ps. This was a fun class to be a part of! I feel like we are all in it together. Thanks for everyone's support!

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Re: Gryd's 2014 Front Yard Renovation - Day 3

Post by andy10917 » August 16th, 2014, 10:16 pm

This was a fun class to be a part of! I feel like we are all in it together. Thanks for everyone's support!
WAS ?? You folks have a long road in front of you. The backbreaking stuff may be done, but it's just like a baby - you think the pregnancy is tough, just to find that was the prelude...

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gryd
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Re: Gryd's 2014 Front Yard Renovation - Day 4

Post by gryd » August 17th, 2014, 4:50 pm

I rested all morning then added a little peat moss to some thin spots. I also trimmed a couple branches on ny spruce that were hit by the sprinkler. Nothing ever grows under those drips! Finally I filled 2 long flower boxes with soil and seeded them so at least I have something if I need a few plugs down the road.

Ok, I need to go out now and start fixing the damage from last weeks shed delivery. This is not gonna be fun :banghead:

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Re: Gryd's 2014 Front Yard Renovation Take 2

Post by fun4me2 » August 17th, 2014, 5:56 pm

ken-n-nancy wrote:
gryd wrote:The main course is done!
Image
Wow, that looks awesome. The grading looks as flat as a table-top, with a very nice even slope. Impressive!
I totally agree. Wow!!
Nice work gryd :good:

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Re: Gryd's 2014 Front Yard Renovation - equipment inspection

Post by gryd » August 18th, 2014, 9:20 pm

Just figured I'd list some reminders to my classmates who scalped their lawns with their own equipment:
Clean or replace air filter
Check oil levels
Sharpen blades
Clean under your mower decks
Treat your engines to some Sea Foam. http://seafoamsales.com/sea-foam-motor-treatment/

When I opened my air filter on my tractor I couldn't believe my eyes. I never saw that more dust and dirt before and I just hope my carburetor didn't ingest too much of that junk. Scalping threw some crazy dust around. I even noticed some got in under my gas cap. Needless to say I replaced the air filter and treated my engine to some Sea Foam. I read about Sea Foam on an equipment maintenance web site. The mechanics were all using it. I know why. My leaf blower was running rough and one dose of Sea Foam had it running better than new. I figured I would throw some in my lawn mowers after what they had been through.

I also noticed I burned some oil in my JD X304 so I added that. Then I changed the blades on both my tractor and push mower. The build up under the deck of my tractor was unbelievable! I had to scrape off the chunks of dirt and grass with a paint scraper. Then I gave my equipment a serious bath.

We all know that scalping can be rough on our equipment but if we are going to scalp then we should inspect and maintain our tools of the trade when the job is done. If you haven't checked your equipment yet then I recommend you do so asap!

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