'New' House old lawn Restoration 2020

Discuss how to and whether you should renovate your lawn
Masbustelo
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Location: Western Illinois, parallel to tip o Lake Michigan.
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Re: 'New' House old lawn Restoration 2020

Post by Masbustelo » November 27th, 2020, 11:18 pm

I accidentally hit submit on that previous post before I edited it. It looks like this late fall winter is coming to an end this weekend. Winter is just around the corner and the growing season has come to an end. My front lawn is non existent. I sprayed the old existing poa trivialis turf with round up for about 4 months last summer and right now I have dead brown turf. I tried seeding into it last August and that experiment failed, with about a zero germination rate. Today I mulch mowed the turf, which probably looked a little crazy to see someone mowing their dead lawn at the end of November. This afternoon I rented an aerator to punch holes through the dead turf. Tomorrow I plan to spread black soil over the top, drag it level, and then seed it next week, before the ground freezes. I used Mazama to the rear of the house and love the color and the dense turf it made. It seems to do well with very little direct sunlight. So I plan to use it in the front yard as well.

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Masbustelo
Posts: 488
Joined: September 14th, 2018, 10:56 pm
Location: Western Illinois, parallel to tip o Lake Michigan.
Grass Type: Mazama KBG
Lawn Size: 20000-1 acre
Level: Some Experience

Re: 'New' House old lawn Restoration 2020

Post by Masbustelo » December 1st, 2020, 5:27 pm

The last few days I aerated the front 8,000 square feet front yard. I then applied 5-6 yards of compost with wheelbarrow and scoop shovel. My goal was to prepare a seed bed that looked like it would support seedlings after the seed sprouted. I have a little homemade drag, that obviously was inexpensive to make ($10), but works quite well. Until the moles attack again,the area really looks good and feels good to walk on.
Image After my initial leveling with the drag I put down my final application of Greenstate fast acting Gypsum. With the lawn being leveled out it was a piece of cake to push the spreader. They have reformulated the gypsum so the pieces are smaller, they go through the spreader much easier. Also Lowes raised the price $3.00 per bag, and did away with the 10% discount. Yesterday I spread 3lbs per K of Mazama KBG. For those that use metrics that was approximately 45 million seeds. Hopefully a good percentage will sprout next spring. After the gypsum and seed went down, I re-dragged the entirety to get some of the seed below the surface.
Image And then finally, today, in the steepest areas I put down 1,000 square feet of erosion mats.
Image Really the last thing I have left to do is put down more of the gypsum on the rear lawn. My original plan last spring was to eliminate the broad leaf weeds which dominated the lawn, and begin to fertilize the grass that I imagined was lurking some where. What I discovered was that after 60 years of neglect, poa trivialis basically had taken over the entire front and rear lawn. Initially I thought it was in spots and areas, so I began to spray glyphosate. Eventually I realized it was everywhere, and ended up killing off all 27,000 square feet of 'lawn'. I was nervous because I'd never done a renovation before. At one point I had a brown desert both front and back. In the midst of a great drought I seeded both the front and back August 23rd, and then in September we had six inches of rain in one week. I don't have an irrigation system, but am on a community well and hand watered, for a few weeks perhaps 22k, which has survived and looks good at this point. Now I will have the front 8k to focus on in spring. It is seeded and over seeded. Much easier to focus on 8k than 22k. So I certainly got lots of experience this year, and my complete renovation extends into 2021. Here and there I see some sprouts of trivialis and intend to hit them with tenacity this week. Next spring I plan on using a pre-emergent on the rear lawn, which will be a new experience for me as well. I think by next October I might have the beginnings of an eye catching lawn. Thanks to everyone who gave me some advice. We'll see how dormant seeding works out.

Masbustelo
Posts: 488
Joined: September 14th, 2018, 10:56 pm
Location: Western Illinois, parallel to tip o Lake Michigan.
Grass Type: Mazama KBG
Lawn Size: 20000-1 acre
Level: Some Experience

Re: 'New' House old lawn Restoration 2020

Post by Masbustelo » December 4th, 2020, 4:13 am

I wrapped up my season by applying fast acting gypsum on Wednesday to the rear 19k lawn. I applied it four times this year, so I'm curious what effect it will show in my spring soil sample.

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MorpheusPA
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Re: 'New' House old lawn Restoration 2020

Post by MorpheusPA » December 4th, 2020, 7:26 pm

Hopefully more calcium, less sodium and magnesium, and a stable pH.

In the real world over here...we'll see. :-)

Masbustelo
Posts: 488
Joined: September 14th, 2018, 10:56 pm
Location: Western Illinois, parallel to tip o Lake Michigan.
Grass Type: Mazama KBG
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Level: Some Experience

Re: 'New' House old lawn Restoration 2020

Post by Masbustelo » December 10th, 2020, 7:58 pm

We had a very mild week and several days ago I mixed up a quart of Tenacity and went around and sprayed all the Trivialis and Annua I could find. Even at this late date it seems to be yellowing already. Today I finally put down my winterizer urea. It's supposed to rain and snow tomorrow. I forget, was I supposed to do 1lb of urea per K, or is it 1lb of nitrogen per K? I put down 1lb of urea per k on the rear lawn.


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andy10917
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Re: 'New' House old lawn Restoration 2020

Post by andy10917 » December 10th, 2020, 9:09 pm

The final Winterizer is 1 lb/K of N. That's ~2 lbs/K of Urea.

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MorpheusPA
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Re: 'New' House old lawn Restoration 2020

Post by MorpheusPA » December 10th, 2020, 10:04 pm

Tru dat. But if you've been feeding well throughout the season, you can ignore that fact and stand pat at around 0.4 pounds of N per thousand. It's fine.

If you'd rather, get out there in the rain and apply 1.2 pounds of urea per K to make up the difference...

Masbustelo
Posts: 488
Joined: September 14th, 2018, 10:56 pm
Location: Western Illinois, parallel to tip o Lake Michigan.
Grass Type: Mazama KBG
Lawn Size: 20000-1 acre
Level: Some Experience

Re: 'New' House old lawn Restoration 2020

Post by Masbustelo » December 11th, 2020, 11:34 am

I think I'll stand pat. (mejor que nada) Its drizzling at 39F degrees with much colder temps for next week. Wow! 2lbs per K of urea is a lot of urea. I fed pretty well through the season and the lawn currently has great color. 2021 isn't that far off. Merry Christmas everybody.

Masbustelo
Posts: 488
Joined: September 14th, 2018, 10:56 pm
Location: Western Illinois, parallel to tip o Lake Michigan.
Grass Type: Mazama KBG
Lawn Size: 20000-1 acre
Level: Some Experience

Re: 'New' House old lawn Restoration 2020

Post by Masbustelo » December 21st, 2020, 10:34 am

Last fall I got attacked by moles. Particularly to the rear of my house. I was so busy at the time I couldn't counter attack. There are so many trails that I can't identify the main tunnels. I want to begin using my new trap, and I'm thinking about renting a roller to smash the tunnels down. I'm thinking any compaction issues will be dealt with by ensuing frost. Yea or nay on the rolling idea? will I do more harm than good?

Masbustelo
Posts: 488
Joined: September 14th, 2018, 10:56 pm
Location: Western Illinois, parallel to tip o Lake Michigan.
Grass Type: Mazama KBG
Lawn Size: 20000-1 acre
Level: Some Experience

Re: 'New' House old lawn Restoration 2020

Post by Masbustelo » December 22nd, 2020, 9:55 am

For those involved in future mole battles. I went ahead and rented the lawn roller. It definitely helped, but I think it would be necessary to use it many more times. At least now I should be able to spot the new tunnels next spring and apply the final solution. Sadly, I think I have a fair number of them. I purchased the Victor 0631 Out O'Sight model. I used to be much more laissez faire with furry creatures, but raising grapes and chickens I learned it's us or them. I border a 250 acre forest, so they do have survival options.
Image

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MorpheusPA
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Re: 'New' House old lawn Restoration 2020

Post by MorpheusPA » December 22nd, 2020, 1:59 pm

That...that looks like a medieval torture device.

edslawn
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Re: 'New' House old lawn Restoration 2020

Post by edslawn » March 7th, 2021, 1:07 pm

andy10917 wrote:
April 26th, 2020, 9:37 am
No, you have to do the math to convert the amount needed in the dilution from the 8% to the 61% product, or read the label on the 61% product for lawn weed control. Be careful when reading the label - Triclopyr is often used to kill brush and woody plants also, but the application rates are stronger and are too much for lawns. Maybe someone else on the site has done the math and can post it.
I know that this is a little old, but very helpful post. I incorrectly mixed Triclopyr around the same time as this post (which I hadn't read at the time) and killed everything where I applied it. I used a 1 oz/gallon rate and have learned my lesson. Luckily, I was able to reseed in the fall and everything is filling in. The 3/8 oz per gallon recommendation helped me understand how much I overdid it.

One question: is necessary (or helpful) to use a surfactant with this mix?

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MorpheusPA
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Re: 'New' House old lawn Restoration 2020

Post by MorpheusPA » March 7th, 2021, 3:38 pm

"One question: is necessary (or helpful) to use a surfactant with this mix?"

Check the instructions. Some come with it already included, but some don't. It depends on the brand. Generics are less likely to have them in my experience while name brands almost always do,

Case in example, similar but not the same--my one generic Glyphosate does not have an included surfactant. My other one does. So what do I do? I just add it to both.

A little extra surfactant never hurts, as long as it's non-ionic (any Spreader Sticker will be non-ionic and rated for pesticides, unless the pesticide itself specifically states not to use one--a warning I've never seen).

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