Lawn reno on a shoestring budget! Please do not flame!

[jfoege]

Thanks for the wisdom! I will read up on the labels and schedule this in somewhere!

[Marinegrunt]

I think mentioned it earlier but read up on Pythium Blight and nitrogen. If you still have it the nitrogen can make it spread. I'm sure the Heritage G will help but I'd still try and find out if you should stop the urea apps until it's completely gone. I'm not sure what the best approach is but I know for a fact urea makes Pythium Blight worse. Ask me how I know.

[jfoege]

I understand. There is no more pythium outbreak occuring in the lower yard reno, and all the nitrogen that is going down on that is done until winterizer apps. The last remaining app of N is coming as the rest of the bag of Lesco 18-24-12 starter @ approx 4# / 1000 sq. ft. on the newest renovated areas, which are about 2.5 weeks old now.

The Headway G along with the cooler weather has really seemed to nail the Pythium.

[Marinegrunt]

If I had to guess I bet you have Dollar Spot or Brown Patch. It sounds like a lot of your grass has grown out of it from the fertilizer and you were seeing brown spots on the blade. If you would've had Pythium Blight the fertilizer usually makes it worse. Plus, the kill of the grass from the Blight is so fast it wouldn't have grown out of it. Did you have patches die within a day before applying the Heritage? I literally went to bed and saw areas that were healthy only to wake up to the same area having a dead spot.

[jfoege]

Yep. Big , wet, cottony patches that poofed overnight. Usually about a foot in diameter!

I did have some rust and dollar spot, too. I had it all!

[jfoege]

On a completely seperate note, I think if I could do it all over again? I'd have rather down a 40 / 40 / 20 or even a 45 / 45 / 10 mix of KBG / FF / PR.

I'd pick at least two cultivars of each of thr KBG and FF and one of the PR. The FF would probably have a creeping red and a chewimgs half half. The PR would be some good NTEP performer. But the KBG? Hmmm....I don't know!

Or perhaps with the lack of good soil and irrigation, best bet is to go 100% FF everywhere.

Just playing the "what if" game here...

[Green]

Just read your last few updates. How's it going for you with the short-term drought we've been having here in our area?

[jfoege]

In my neck of the woods, we've only had about 4 in of rain in the last 8 or 9 weeks! With the brunt of it on the first week of Aug and first week of Sep. That plus the high temps we had all Aug and Sep, my one sprinkler and sandy, crap soil? Yea. Let's just say its been rough. Some patches have died out that were ultra sandy and rocky and in direct sun or had garbage fill underneath (pavement, bricks, roadway chunks, etc). But, now, at least I'll know next spring where to dig and put down 6in of good screened topsoil!

I'm itching to put down 0.5# N as 10-10-10 on Oct 15th on the 6500 sq ft lower reno. It just got hit last week with 0.75# N and 0.75# N at seed down 4 weeks prior to that. The newly seeded areas need their second dose of starter fert around that time.

How have you been doing on the irrigaton front? Any fungal disease last week? Approx what area of the state are you in if you dont mind me asking?

Cheers,

John

[Green]

Sounds about the same. The only rain here this past month was about 2 hundredths of an inch last week! I don't say exactly where I live on here, but I think we are in the same general area.

The overseeded areas, I've been watering as needed, which is at least once a day or more as some was recently planted in the past week. Combination of irrigation system, hand watering, and sprinklers to get the coverage I need.

The low input area is an over 6K area that doesn't get much supplemental irrigation, and where I don't go nuts about weeds or bare spots. I've watered its few times this year. There are some dead and dormant areas. I might break my pre-M barrier and drop a PR/FF mix in the worst ones...not sure yet. I tried doing plugs, but they're barely holding on. Last fertilizer there was Milo in spots, and before that, 2.5 lbs/K of 10-10-10... which I don't know if the meager rain diluted sufficiently. I've been spraying Hydretain ES Plus II. I think it helps, but it's no miracle solution either.

I have rust on a 1K part of the north facing main lawn. Finally did something about it on advice from members here who had bad luck this time of year leaving it untreated.