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What so I do about my first-time frozen st Augustine lawn in Corpus Christi—

Posted: March 2nd, 2021, 11:34 am
by CCtexas
I’ve never had my st Augustine freeze and turn the color of hay. And we are in a drought. Cornmeal to start?

Re: What so I do about my first-time frozen st Augustine lawn in Corpus Christi—

Posted: March 2nd, 2021, 3:47 pm
by MorpheusPA
I'd wait to see if it greens up. Most people are reporting good results, giving it some time and simply letting it return.

Once it greens up, and not all of it may return, then feed gently with something like corn meal if you want. But don't jolt it heavily, and don't force it. But do keep it damp to moist to allow it to return to a good environment after the kick in the pants it just got from your horrible weather.

St. Aug isn't a heavy feeder, but in this one instance, I'll countenance feeding a little bit in spring if you really feel you have to over-care. :-) Corn meal will be fine. 10-15 pounds per thousand would be a little treat for a battered lawn.

Re: What so I do about my first-time frozen st Augustine lawn in Corpus Christi—

Posted: March 3rd, 2021, 2:35 pm
by CCtexas
Thank you. I have a good source for corn meal. I do actually see some green already starting.

Re: What so I do about my first-time frozen st Augustine lawn in Corpus Christi—

Posted: March 8th, 2021, 12:06 am
by Dchall_San_Antonio
I have some green in Bandera (two nights of 8 degrees F and several days below freezing). The older Floratam took the biggest hit and is straw colored. The new Raleigh came through mostly green, but clearly not growing. I'm not worried. Will proceed like normal expecting it to awaken fully by the end of the month.
I am going to do something daring this year. In April, assuming it is all up and growing, I'm going to scalp it down to the mower's lowest setting. The Aussie Lawn YouTube channel guy did that on his St Aug this past spring and had amazing results. I'll be sure to let you know how it works for me. I have some spots that need to be leveled, so that's the reason for scalping.
Speaking of corn meal, Tractor Supply now carries a product called chicken crumbles. It is a high protein product and fairly dirt cheap. What's really nice is that it flows easily through a spreader without clumping. It's up to use to come up with a spreader setting for the best application. I would start with whatever the Milorganite bag says and adjust from there.

Re: What so I do about my first-time frozen st Augustine lawn in Corpus Christi—

Posted: June 26th, 2021, 6:08 pm
by shay
Dchall_San_Antonio wrote:
March 8th, 2021, 12:06 am
I have some green in Bandera (two nights of 8 degrees F and several days below freezing). The older Floratam took the biggest hit and is straw colored. The new Raleigh came through mostly green, but clearly not growing. I'm not worried. Will proceed like normal expecting it to awaken fully by the end of the month.
I am going to do something daring this year. In April, assuming it is all up and growing, I'm going to scalp it down to the mower's lowest setting. The Aussie Lawn YouTube channel guy did that on his St Aug this past spring and had amazing results. I'll be sure to let you know how it works for me. I have some spots that need to be leveled, so that's the reason for scalping.
Speaking of corn meal, Tractor Supply now carries a product called chicken crumbles. It is a high protein product and fairly dirt cheap. What's really nice is that it flows easily through a spreader without clumping. It's up to use to come up with a spreader setting for the best application. I would start with whatever the Milorganite bag says and adjust from there.
How did your St Augustine do with the scalping? I've never cut mine lower than the highest setting.

Re: What so I do about my first-time frozen st Augustine lawn in Corpus Christi—

Posted: July 12th, 2021, 8:06 pm
by Dchall_San_Antonio
With the freeze damage, I chickened out on the scalping I was going to do. I ended up with large patches where the St Aug did not come back and was replaced by dormant bermuda. No problem for me, though, I'M MOVING AWAY!! Even so bermuda doesn't bother me. The yard used to be substantially bermuda and the St Aug dominated it. It will happen again.

So instead of taking it down to 1 on the mower, I took it down to 3 from normal 6. The grass looks great, but we've had about 30 inches of rain this year, so everything looks great.

The lawn at the new house is not all that dense. I suspect it has not been fertilized in a long time (years??). There are also some dead spots which I suspect were caused by broken sprinkler heads. Haven't needed to address that issue, yet, due to all the rain.