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jskierko's Fall 2020 Bewitched Front Renovation

Posted: July 24th, 2020, 5:54 pm
by jskierko
Background: Moved into this house in 2012 (house had 1 prior owner, built in 2011). Yard was likely seeded with contractors mix or simple northern mix. I have overseeded a few years back with a Scott's Sun and Shade mix, so right now the lawn is a good mix of bluegrass, rye, and fine fescue (with some nasty clumping tall fescue mixed in). I got really into lawn care last year and I came across this site. Thank you for all the information and insight. My previous practices were cutting the yard (mostly bagging) once a week with disregard to the 1/3 rule and spot spraying weeds when areas exploded in the yard. I have become more diligent with pre-emergent applications, fertilization, and reacting to what my yard is displaying. Last year I installed a 14 zone irrigation system, top dressed entire yard with compost to add OM, followed Milorganite holiday applications, and went through aggressive fall nitrogen regimen. This year I added a preventative Serenade regimen, conditioned soil bi-weekly with Kelp/Humic/SLS and have experimented with PGR and foliar iron applications.

Overall my current NoMix is probably one of the nicer lawns in the neighborhood due in part to a lot of the work I have been putting in over the last 1-2 years, but I want to take things to the next level. I will be renovating my front/side yard, deciding on a Bewitched monostand. I have read through several renovations threads on various sites and looked at previous years NTEP results, and the overall look, texture, and compact growing height appealed to me. The total area encompasses ~8000 sq ft of turf. Rough timeline as follows:

7/30: Glyphosate blanket app #1
8/5: Scalp mow and bag #1
8/7: Glyphosate blanket app #2
8/12: Scalp mow and bag #2
8/14: Glyphosate spot spray
8/15: Top Dress with top soil to level/fill low spots
8/16: Seed Down @ 3oz/k (w/ Soil Moist seed coat?), Roll, Tenacity or Scott's Starter w/ Tenacity (pending soil test results from Logan Labs next week), top dress w/ 0.25" peat

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Arial shot from 5/22. All areas of the lot except for fenced in back yard will be renovated. Left side of picture (east side of house) basically gets morning and early afternoon sun. Rest of yard basically full sun throughout the day. Back yard is about 10k sq ft and, depending on results of this renovation, may be a 2021 renovation. I have a few test plots with other cultivars that I plan to try in back yard this year.

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Front yard shot from 7/3. Yard looks tired around the edges, fescues/ryes drying out despite irrigation 2x/week. As is the case with a lot of developments in the area, I think the builders buried a lot of construction debris next to driveways and sidewalks (based on observations with screwdriver test). Although I don't want to disturb soil I may take blank slate as an opportunity to dig out some problem areas.

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Seed on hand.

Certainly I am forgetting a lot of detail, but I will post pics of timeline events and progress.

Re: jskierko's Fall 2020 Bewitched Front Renovation

Posted: July 25th, 2020, 4:06 am
by Masbustelo
I have some of that clumping fescue as well. It is a real eyesore and seems you could trip over it or sprain an ankle mowing. It is nasty stuff.

Re: jskierko's Fall 2020 Bewitched Front Renovation

Posted: July 25th, 2020, 6:26 am
by schreibdave
Sounds like a good plan - good luck. I will be renovating 4K sqft in my backyard this year and I will follow the same schedule.

Re: jskierko's Fall 2020 Bewitched Front Renovation

Posted: July 31st, 2020, 8:01 am
by jskierko
Yesterday (7/30) was my original 1st glyphosate day. The weatherman actually got a long term forecast right and it rained steadily almost all day. Since I knew it was my only day off of work for the week and the chance of rain was high, I decided to pull the trigger earlier. I did 1st app on 7/26. Used blue marking dye to make application coverage easier to see.

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7/26: glyphosate #1

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7/30: a few areas didn't get great coverage. I used 1 gal pump sprayer for perimeter and hose end sprayer towards middle of lawn where accuracy wasn't as much of an issue. As you can see from the pic, hose end sprayer doesn't always put it down as evenly as desired. A few areas holding on, but that's why we're going multiple rounds.

Re: jskierko's Fall 2020 Bewitched Front Renovation

Posted: July 31st, 2020, 4:09 pm
by schreibdave
That RU worked fast. I generally use the generic version which I think is missing one of the components of brand name RU - it works a lot slower.

Do you have a back pack sprayer? You might want to add it to the collection of tools. Especially for things like blanket spraying tenacity.

My plan is to RU my 4000 sqft back yard tomorrow. And seed down August 15.

Re: jskierko's Fall 2020 Bewitched Front Renovation

Posted: August 1st, 2020, 4:20 pm
by jskierko
schreibdave wrote:
July 31st, 2020, 4:09 pm
That RU worked fast. I generally use the generic version which I think is missing one of the components of brand name RU - it works a lot slower.

Do you have a back pack sprayer? You might want to add it to the collection of tools. Especially for things like blanket spraying tenacity.
I used the purple cap super concentrate, which only has glyphosate as AI. I also used a 41% generic for some of the deed as well.

I do have a backpack sprayer, but was not willing to risk tainting it with RU. I plan on using it for tenacity sometime a month or so after seeding.

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8/1: Start of the scalp/bag process. Still putting down some good stripes!

Re: jskierko's Fall 2020 Bewitched Front Renovation

Posted: August 1st, 2020, 5:16 pm
by schreibdave
Nice! Are the neighbors talking about you?

Re: jskierko's Fall 2020 Bewitched Front Renovation

Posted: August 2nd, 2020, 6:32 pm
by jskierko
schreibdave wrote:
August 1st, 2020, 5:16 pm
Nice! Are the neighbors talking about you?
I've had a few looky-loos. I live on a cul-de-sac, so I know everyone that regularly drives by. I was out scalping today and waved to a few curious cats driving by.

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8/2: aerial shot- right side of picture mowed down to 1 3/8", left side at 2 1/8" (2 days behind).

Re: jskierko's Fall 2020 Bewitched Front Renovation

Posted: August 5th, 2020, 11:43 am
by mdxers
how do you put down that much peat moss? I am doing 4000 sq ft and I plan on doing a wood fiber blanket. Any thoughts?

Re: jskierko's Fall 2020 Bewitched Front Renovation

Posted: August 5th, 2020, 12:16 pm
by Paul
Peat Moss roller


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Re: jskierko's Fall 2020 Bewitched Front Renovation

Posted: August 5th, 2020, 9:48 pm
by jskierko
mdxers wrote:
August 5th, 2020, 11:43 am
how do you put down that much peat moss? I am doing 4000 sq ft and I plan on doing a wood fiber blanket. Any thoughts?
I plan on spreading all (15ish 3 cu ft bales) by hand. As much as I'd love the convenience of the peat moss roller that Paul mentioned (considering I used a lot of his reno as my inspiration), I don't mind the time/labor investment of doing it by hand. I consider yard work to be my outdoor gym. I have seen some videos using the fiber blankets and they seem to work well, but can be a little messy on the back end. I know peat is messy on the front end, but by the time you are mowing it is a non-issue. The blankets can get caught under the mower deck and I think that would be a source of frustration for me.

I will be using some tackifier in a heavily sloped drainage area and some more mild slopes off my front walk to try to prevent any potential runoff.

Re: jskierko's Fall 2020 Bewitched Front Renovation

Posted: August 6th, 2020, 8:13 pm
by jskierko
2nd glyphosate blanket app 8/6, 11 days after 1st application. One side of yard mowed down to 1", other side at 1.33". Still on pace for seed down on 8/15.

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Re: jskierko's Fall 2020 Bewitched Front Renovation

Posted: August 6th, 2020, 8:18 pm
by jskierko
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One of the only times where someone inadvertently driving on my lawn doesn't really bother me. 2 weeks from now I'd have taken a different stance on this mishap.

Re: jskierko's Fall 2020 Bewitched Front Renovation

Posted: August 7th, 2020, 6:33 am
by schreibdave
Looks good. Did you mow and bag all of that dead grass yourself? I only killed off about 4K sqft and I got lucky that the HOA's mowing contractor was in the neighborhood yesterday. He scalped it with his big riding mower with bags on the back. He still had to make several stops to dump the bags into the truck. Would have been a big job for me and my Honda walk behind mower.

My experience from last years bigger renovation was that I got MUCH better germination where I had grass stuble than where I had bare dirt. There was a huge difference.

Re: jskierko's Fall 2020 Bewitched Front Renovation

Posted: August 7th, 2020, 11:18 pm
by jskierko
schreibdave wrote:
August 7th, 2020, 6:33 am
Did you mow and bag all of that dead grass yourself?
Yes, 30 full yard bags and a nice monetary donation to the trash men for collecting all of them for me.
schreibdave wrote:
August 7th, 2020, 6:33 am
My experience from last years bigger renovation was that I got MUCH better germination where I had grass stuble than where I had bare dirt. There was a huge difference.
Good advice! I will limit my soil additions before seeding to filling low areas only rather than going widespread.

Re: jskierko's Fall 2020 Bewitched Front Renovation

Posted: August 12th, 2020, 8:27 am
by jskierko
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Ready for seed down!

Re: jskierko's Fall 2020 Bewitched Front Renovation

Posted: August 12th, 2020, 9:14 pm
by DevilDawg81
You’re all set, good luck!

Re: jskierko's Fall 2020 Bewitched Front Renovation

Posted: August 13th, 2020, 7:30 am
by schreibdave
As soon as I finish my breakfast I am headed outside to work on my reno. With luck I will get the tenacity down, seed spread and compost top dressing down before the end of the day. Tomorrow will be roller and makeshift fence to keep the dog off it.

Good luck

Re: jskierko's Fall 2020 Bewitched Front Renovation

Posted: August 13th, 2020, 11:00 am
by turf_toes
schreibdave wrote:
August 13th, 2020, 7:30 am
As soon as I finish my breakfast I am headed outside to work on my reno. With luck I will get the tenacity down, seed spread and compost top dressing down before the end of the day. Tomorrow will be roller and makeshift fence to keep the dog off it.

Good luck
If it were my project, I’d apply the Tenacity last. Of course, I’d also probably skip the top dressing.

I’ve done about a dozen renovations over the years. In some of the early ones I topdressed.

I’ve had the best results with seed, roll, tenacity.

Re: jskierko's Fall 2020 Bewitched Front Renovation

Posted: August 13th, 2020, 11:12 am
by schreibdave
if it were my project, I’d apply the Tenacity last. Of course, I’d also probably skip the top dressing.

I’ve done about a dozen renovations over the years. In some of the early ones I topdressed.

I’ve had the best results with seed, roll, tenacity.
Where I have grass stubble, I can see the top dress being unnecessary. But I have a PU truck full of compost outside so I'll use it up.