aroundtheyard.com Forums

When I first moved into my current home the lawn was in terrible shape, in fact it was mostly weeds. Needless to say, we had it torn up and reseeded. We also signed up to have a lawn service company come by and put down 4 treatments per year. Each year things look great in the spring but being conscious about use of water and regular summer droughts, I choose not to water. That said, with the hot, dry summer we've had here in Southern CT, being southern facing, and with no shade between 8am and 6pm the lawn is totally fried this year.

With the window for fall seeding fast approaching, I am looking for recommendations on seed that will stand up to full sun and little to no watering outside of what mother nature provides. I don't need the deepest green, or densest grass in the neighborhood, just something that I'm not ashamed of every time I step outside.

With the parameters you’ve set, (no watering or maintenance), there are very few options that will look good and survive those conditions.

Maybe an unimproved tall fescue, like Ky-31? That’s a wide-bladed grass that looks to many like a weed.

You could plug zoysia. But it would take several years to fill in and it turns beige in the cooler months.

Could we maybe look at other things you (or your contractor) are doing? Maybe different fertilizer, timing or mowing practices will make enough of an improvement.

Most people don’t seem to realize lawns need water. There are some people who don’t water at all, but they also seem to live with the dormancy that comes from it.

Some grass like kbg, if it’s mature enough can go dormant, but even then, do not expect a kbg lawn to just go back to its prime June appearance after one rain storm in September. It might not recover again until next spring.

You might want to go with some kind of native wild plants if you want no maintenance, because any type of grass you have needs fertilizer and water if you have a months long drought. Typical spring and fall weather will only give you a decent lawn for about 4 months a year. Then again that’s probably when my lawn looks good, and I water twice a week :-(

Never mind what I said, see where your coming from :-)

If you lived in the west, I could advise you on native grasses, but I'm not familiar with grasses that are native to Connecticut.

As turf tires said, k31 is pretty resilient. It's tough to kill, but it does die, and it's a bunch grass, so when it dies, you'll need to seed those areas. And it's not the most attractive grass.