Lawn care nuts

[God is a Husker]

Love Kentucky Bluegrass. Nothing will feel as good under the feet as that and nothing gets that rich dark green color like it does in the spring/fall. Expensive to take care of during the summer months with watering compared to fescue, but man, it was always worth it to me. On the new house, Nebraska Sod put in their blend of Kentucky Bluegrass and Buffalo grass. Been pretty awesome in that it looks and feels like Bluegrass but hasn't seemed to need as much water. Also helps that I get commercial fertilizer to put down and then supplement in between with Milorganite.

My last lawn was a full Buffalo grass lawn and I had a totally separate well for the UGS so I watered it twice a day everyday and it looked AMAZING.


God damn I miss that lawn



But I do love bluegrass, especially cuz they don’t have any stickers

 

[Eaton Beaver]

It's pretty easy guys! Find a seed that grows well in the conditions you have...but then you have to water the hell out of till it makes it's way. Then back off and let roots dig in for a week or two. Start by scratching the area dirt up then spread the seed and then pack it down with a roller or golf cart tire. Whatever work's! Then water it morning and night leaving ground moist and boom it grows! Let it thicken before being mowed or rope it off and then treat it for winter protection.

 

[kenyanfeline]

Building my house on an existing acreage and should Be moving in in September.

Super excited to get my own going as there main lawn portion will be roughly 3 acres.

Problem is, it is currently filled with 3-4 foot tall weeds. Buttonweed, vineweed, crabgrass, you name it.

I’ve never started a lawn from this stage before. Any tips?

I will not have underground sprinklers and there will be very little shade to start with.

 

[Toe]

@kenyanfeline Time to rent a roto-tiller. IDK if anything has already been installed at your place, but be wary of stuff like cable TV lines, they're sometimes buried just a couple inches deep.

You'll also definitely want to put down a pre-emergent (often marked on the bag as 'weed preventer' or something). The seeds of all those weeds you just cut down are still there in the soil, so you use a pre-emergent to stop them from sprouting. Be mindful of what the bag says about seeding! Obviously you don't want your pre-emergent to stop your grass seeds from sprouting. I like Scotts Triple Action Built for Seeding, it's a starter fertilizer plus a pre-emergent that's safe for seeding cool season lawns.

The kind of grass to put down depends on where you live. If you're in Nebraska, you'll want a cool season grass like tall fescue or Kentucky bluegrass. KBG spreads naturally on its own, so if an area is damaged, it will often spread to heal itself. The drawback is that it needs more water and fertilizer than tall fescue. Tall fescue is also more heat and drought-tolerant than KBG. It doesn't spread naturally, however, so you'll want to overseed it occasionally to keep it thick. And remember that one of the best defenses against weeds is just having a thick lawn with no space for weeds to take root.

You need to keep the seeds and sprouts wet all the time when they're first coming up so that they don't dry out. But as they start to get established, they need to start growing a deep root system, which they won't do if they can get all the water they need right at the surface. So when you're watering your new lawn, start out with frequent light waterings (two or even three times a day) to keep the surface wet, and then transition to less frequent but heavier waterings that soak into the ground but give the surface time to dry out a bit. Best time to water is around dawn, but for those initial stages you might set up a timer to do one watering at like 4am and another at 10am.

Also depending on where you're at, you might need to get started on this stuff a little before you move in. Cool season grasses are best seeded around late August to mid September.

 

[Boondock_St_Sker]

I went KY Bluegrass in my areas near/or under trees but in the backyard I went with this because it’s designed for high traffic and the wear and tear kids/dogs put on a lawn.


Expensive as fuck but great

Amazon product ASIN B0876FW3GP

I've gone with Macho Mix from the Grass Pad for the last couple of years, it's proven reliable so far. I have two Rotties that love to run and dig their paws into the grass..is this a 100% winner...no but it's pretty good for the price

 

[God is a Husker]

I've gone with Macho Mix from the Grass Pad for the last couple of years, it's proven reliable so far. I have two Rotties that love to run and dig their paws into the grass..is this a 100% winner...no but it's pretty good for the price

Post pics of the puppies


Please and Thankyou, my wife loves Rottweilers cuz that’s 1 of the 3 breeds she grew up. (They had 8-12 dogs at any time of: German Shepard, Rottweiler, Rhodesian Ridgeback. She didn’t realize until she was like 10 years old that “her puppies” were actually the guard dogs for the compound. Africa life.)

 

[Boondock_St_Sker]

Post pics of the puppies


Please and Thankyou, my wife loves Rottweilers cuz that’s 1 of the 3 breeds she grew up. (They had 8-12 dogs at any time of: German Shepard, Rottweiler, Rhodesian Ridgeback. She didn’t realize until she was like 10 years old that “her puppies” were actually the guard dogs for the compound. Africa life.)

 

[God is a Husker]

View attachment 11715View attachment 11716View attachment 11717View attachment 11718View attachment 11719View attachment 11720

Gonna go show my boss, she is gonna love it


Thanks brother

 

[Boondock_St_Sker]

Gonna go show my boss, she is gonna love it


Thanks brother

glad to do it...maybe she'll get so excited she'll boss you around a little...know what I mean...

 

[God is a Husker]

glad to do it...maybe she'll get so excited she'll boss you around a little...know what I mean...

You have no idea how much I’d pay for my wife to be that cool.


In real life I’m over here trading 30 mins foot rubs for a quick cowgirl with the pregnant boobs in my face.

 

[kenyanfeline]

@kenyanfeline Time to rent a roto-tiller. IDK if anything has already been installed at your place, but be wary of stuff like cable TV lines, they're sometimes buried just a couple inches deep.

You'll also definitely want to put down a pre-emergent (often marked on the bag as 'weed preventer' or something). The seeds of all those weeds you just cut down are still there in the soil, so you use a pre-emergent to stop them from sprouting. Be mindful of what the bag says about seeding! Obviously you don't want your pre-emergent to stop your grass seeds from sprouting. I like Scotts Triple Action Built for Seeding, it's a starter fertilizer plus a pre-emergent that's safe for seeding cool season lawns.

The kind of grass to put down depends on where you live. If you're in Nebraska, you'll want a cool season grass like tall fescue or Kentucky bluegrass. KBG spreads naturally on its own, so if an area is damaged, it will often spread to heal itself. The drawback is that it needs more water and fertilizer than tall fescue. Tall fescue is also more heat and drought-tolerant than KBG. It doesn't spread naturally, however, so you'll want to overseed it occasionally to keep it thick. And remember that one of the best defenses against weeds is just having a thick lawn with no space for weeds to take root.

You need to keep the seeds and sprouts wet all the time when they're first coming up so that they don't dry out. But as they start to get established, they need to start growing a deep root system, which they won't do if they can get all the water they need right at the surface. So when you're watering your new lawn, start out with frequent light waterings (two or even three times a day) to keep the surface wet, and then transition to less frequent but heavier waterings that soak into the ground but give the surface time to dry out a bit. Best time to water is around dawn, but for those initial stages you might set up a timer to do one watering at like 4am and another at 10am.

Also depending on where you're at, you might need to get started on this stuff a little before you move in. Cool season grasses are best seeded around late August to mid September.

Good stuff, thanks. I’m gonna have to buy a shot lid of that Scott’s Built for Seeding but that’s ok.

I actually have a tiller attachment for my skid steer and then was planning on dragging it when it’s dry to smooth it out.

So:

1. Spray RoundUp to kill existing weeds in the next few weeks. Maybe repeat?

2. Till it once everything is good and dead.

3. Let it dry out, round up again.

4. Drag it to smooth it out.

5. Throw a shit load of Milorganite on it because why not.

6. Apply Scott’s Safe for Seeding

7. Seed

8. Water

Sound right?

 

[Toe]

If you're gonna till it and use a pre-emergent, you probably don't need to bother with glyphosate, unless maybe you've got some brush that's too thick to till otherwise. IDK about Milorganite, but generally your second fertilizer application should be done around November, when the grass is green but not actively growing.

 

[Dell Husker]

I just bought my home a year and a half ago. Last fall we killed it all and started fresh. It came in good almost everywhere but a couple areas. We overseeded again this spring so I wasn’t able to get a preemergent down. Really struggling now with some crab grass on the edges and knocking down some clover. I’m going to aerate and overseed areas again in a month or so and use a starter fertilizer. Should have enough growth to wrap it all up in the fall with another application

 

[Huskerbuck85]

Building my house on an existing acreage and should Be moving in in September.

Super excited to get my own going as there main lawn portion will be roughly 3 acres.

Problem is, it is currently filled with 3-4 foot tall weeds. Buttonweed, vineweed, crabgrass, you name it.

I’ve never started a lawn from this stage before. Any tips?

I will not have underground sprinklers and there will be very little shade to start with.

Mow or shred it. Combine roundup with 2-4d and smoke it about 5 days after you mowed it. Till it up, wait for a good rain to get new weed seeds germinated and smoke it again with that same mix. Then do the stages of seeding and watering but not until 10 days after your last chemical application that has 2-4d in it.

 

[Huskerbuck85]

I just bought my home a year and a half ago. Last fall we killed it all and started fresh. It came in good almost everywhere but a couple areas. We overseeded again this spring so I wasn’t able to get a preemergent down. Really struggling now with some crab grass on the edges and knocking down some clover. I’m going to aerate and overseed areas again in a month or so and use a starter fertilizer. Should have enough growth to wrap it all up in the fall with another application

For the crab grass you can use quinclorac (just bought a bottle for $37 and it does an acre) or Callisto (check sp).

 

[Toe]

Really struggling now with some crab grass on the edges and knocking down some clover.

Do you know if it's actual crabgrass, or are you just using that as a generic name for any grassy weed (like a lot of people do)? If it's actual crabgrass, quinclorac is what you probably want. There's other grassy weeds that can be a pain in the ass to get rid of.

Annual bluegrass (AKA poa annua or just poa) is one of the more infamous ones. It sprouts in fall (which is why you need to get a pre-emergent down), but you often don't realize it's there until spring, when it puts up a metric fuckton of seedheads even if you try to mow it short. The good news is that it'll die on its own in the summer heat. The bad news is all those fucking seeds that it already spread across your lawn ensure that it'll be back next year to haunt you.

The front yard of the house I'm renting now was overgrown with dallisgrass when I moved in. There's very few selective herbicides that work against it, and even fewer that can be used on a cool season lawn. I just nuked the whole front yard with glyphosate to get rid of it.

 

[Dell Husker]

Do you know if it's actual crabgrass, or are you just using that as a generic name for any grassy weed (like a lot of people do)? If it's actual crabgrass, quinclorac is what you probably want. There's other grassy weeds that can be a pain in the ass to get rid of.

Annual bluegrass (AKA poa annua or just poa) is one of the more infamous ones. It sprouts in fall (which is why you need to get a pre-emergent down), but you often don't realize it's there until spring, when it puts up a metric fuckton of seedheads even if you try to mow it short. The good news is that it'll die on its own in the summer heat. The bad news is all those fucking seeds that it already spread across your lawn ensure that it'll be back next year to haunt you.

The front yard of the house I'm renting now was overgrown with dallisgrass when I moved in. There's very few selective herbicides that work against it, and even fewer that can be used on a cool season lawn. I just nuked the whole front yard with glyphosate to get rid of it.

It looks like a crabgrass. Thoughts?

 

[David Webb]

View attachment 11734View attachment 11735
It looks like a crabgrass. Thoughts?

It’s crabgrass.

 

[David Webb]

Good stuff, thanks. I’m gonna have to buy a shot lid of that Scott’s Built for Seeding but that’s ok.

I actually have a tiller attachment for my skid steer and then was planning on dragging it when it’s dry to smooth it out.

So:

1. Spray RoundUp to kill existing weeds in the next few weeks. Maybe repeat?

2. Till it once everything is good and dead.

3. Let it dry out, round up again.

4. Drag it to smooth it out.

5. Throw a shit load of Milorganite on it because why not.

6. Apply Scott’s Safe for Seeding

7. Seed

8. Water

Sound right?

There can be a lot of different approaches/recommendations, but I’ll give you the one I think is most important at the beginning. Since you are starting with bare ground, I would do everything possible to make sure the ground is level and has proper slope. It’s really hard to go back and fix this after the fact.

 

[djw004]

Love Kentucky Bluegrass. Nothing will feel as good under the feet as that and nothing gets that rich dark green color like it does in the spring/fall. Expensive to take care of during the summer months with watering compared to fescue, but man, it was always worth it to me. On the new house, Nebraska Sod put in their blend of Kentucky Bluegrass and Buffalo grass. Been pretty awesome in that it looks and feels like Bluegrass but hasn't seemed to need as much water. Also helps that I get commercial fertilizer to put down and then supplement in between with Milorganite.

Effing LOVE Milorganite. the best.