Being Upfront With Our Gardening

This week, we're concentrating on the front yard, starting with the lawn. Previously, back in December, we overseeded out lawn with a heat-resistant blend.

With the El Nino rains, the seeds have sprouted and I think it's finally time to mow.

The mower hasn't run since October but it starts the first try.

Lawn is done.  See the difference from the day we seeded to today?  Much greener.

There's still a big brown patch of thatched St. Augustine in the middle.  I'll hit that with my aerator tool and see if I can coax some more green grass to come up there.

Darryl

Copyright 2016 - Darryl Musick

All Rights Reserved

Giving the Green One More Try

About a month and a half ago, we overseeded the front lawn with a new heat-tolerant strain of grass seed.

Winter rains have been coming in regularly at a rate of about 1 storm every week and a half.  This provideds a great soaking and the first one came right after I seeded the lawy.

I've added my own water, via a ten minute sprinkler session, about once in between each storm.

This is how the new grass is looking now, I think it will be ready for its first mowing this weekend.

I haven't started my lawn mower since September, since the grass went completely dormant after I stopped watering due to our water rationing restrictions.  I just hope it will still start.

After that, I'll need to work on de-thatching those brown spots of St. Augustine grass.

Darryl
Copyright 2016 - Darryl Musick
All Rights Reserved

The First Chore of Spring

I know winter has barely started but I've got a lucky break with the weather and a chance to revitalize my brown, bald spotted, drought parched lawn.

In the last couple of years, I've overseeded with drought resistant grass seed. That worked fairly well and gave me a lush, green lawn for about 4 months but wilted under our 100+ degree summer heat fairly rapidly with our states water rationing scheme.

This year, I'll add to that a bag of heat resistant seed just to see what happens.

It rained pretty good on Friday so I had a damp lawn, with soft soil, to aerate on Saturday. I then overseeded with the spreader.

We're expecting two days of rain on Sunday so that will give me two days of watering in and I don't have to worry about running afoul of the water cops.

It should be a wet winter here, so I'm hoping that it'll take a minimum of spinkler use to get it germinated and established. Then we'll see just how 'heat-resistant' this grass really is.

Darryl
Copyright 2015 - Darryl Musick
All Rights Reserved

Deacon Blues

"They got a name for the winners in the world, I wanna name when I lose. They call Alabama the Crimson Tide...call me Deacon Blues."
Deacon Blues
Steely Dan

Last week, I showed you some of the winners of the garden. This week, it's the losers' turn. Luckily we didn't have too many. Last year was an almost complete lost season. This year is much, much better.

I'm not complaining at all but let's see what didn't work this year.

At the top of the page is our grape vine, which is always a challenge. One year I got 50 pounds of grapes. The next, all the local animals ate them before they ripened. In the years since, I've tried various methods to keep the animals out and have had limited to no success.

This years, I kept the animals out by wrapping the clusters in nets but the resulting fruit was tiny and cracked.  Not nearly as good as the grapes I got at the farmers market for $2 a pound.  I'm just going to let the plant alone next year and see what happens.

The zucchini, usually the most prolific plant in the garden, only produced two very small fruit over the season.  I'll try a different variety next year.

I believe the corn was a victim of an unnoticed clogged sprinkler at the beginning of the season. It never came back.

The severe drought we're experiencing also hit some of the plants. These roses have no blooms because the deer have been coming down from the dry mountains in search of food. They found a taste for the flowers and eat them up as soon as they bloom.

Maybe next year we'll get that El Nino we keep waiting for and the deer can return home.

This rose just gave up the ghost.  I think I'll replace it with a Saint Patrick rose.

The biggest victim is the lawn, which is really a victim of the law. We're mandated not to water it more than two days a week, 15 minutes at a time.  With no shade at all, it just couldn't handle that diet so dormancy kicked in and it's just straw now.

I'm hoping we'll get enough water this year that I can overseed with a heat-resistant blend for next year.

Darryl
Copyright 2015 - Darryl Musick
All Rights Reserved

To Lawn or Not to Lawn...That is Today's Question

Before reading this, you may want to check out the posts leading up to this finale of our Earth Week series...

Part One
Part Two
Part Three
Part Four

It's been portrayed as our patriotic duty. Much like Liberty Gardens or food rationing in World War II, we Californians are being told lawns are passe and we need to let them die to be good water users.

Funny thing is, we've been conserving water for years and still use a lot less than people around us. Now, partly because they couldn't be bothered to cut back, we have to cut even deeper and all eyes are on that semi-green patch in front of the house.

Part of me says, fine. Let it go.  You won't have to mow it anymore.  The other part of me says it'll be dusty, ugly, and the grass has other benefits besides looking nice and creating a soft place to step.

So what are the benefits of a lawn?  It creates habitat for bugs which feed the birds. It filters water going back to the aquifer. It keeps the dust down. It creates oxygen. It has a cooling effect on the air. It improves the value of a property.

What are the drawbacks? It takes water. In our case, about 10% of our monthly water. You have to mow it regularly. You have to do other maintenance such as feeding and de-thatching.

Now, looking at the pros and cons, what do I do?  

When a lawn goes dormant, such as in the cold of winter back east or the scorching heat of summer out here in the west, it doesn't really die and will sprout readily when fall rains come again.

I've cut back to where I still comfortably land in the water use guidelines and regulations to our state so I think I will continue until the lawn browns on its own when the summer heat gets too much for it. At that point, I will cut it off and wait for a wetter winter and fall to see how it comes back.

Sure beat mowing it every weekend this summer.

I hope you've enjoyed our Earth Week series and that it's helped you to be water-wise in your own gardening. Next time, it's back to our little patch of urban garden, our follies, and triumphs.

Darryl
Copyright 2015 - Darryl Musick
All Rights Reserved

Trying to Give the Babies Some Room To Grow

A couple of weeks ago, I spread out a leftover bag of grass seed on the lawn. While from afar, it doesn't look to bad, up close, you can see a lot of weeds.

Here is some oxalis, which is relatively harmless.

Some dandelions, like this one, hide very well in the grass. Left alone, they will pretty much take over and spread like wildfire.

I need to get in there and start getting the intruders out so my grass seedlings can grow into a thick, lush mat. I'm also trying to go organic as much as possible and, while it would be very easy to just spray Roundup on it, I will try to hand pull the weeds.

Tools for today are a round edge hoe and a small fork.

The hoe is shoved under the weed to get under the roots and the fork finishes up by plucking it out and putting it into the bin.

It's backbreaking work, so I get my hand-held trowel and see how easy it is on my knees. Turns out, it's much easier than the hoe and fork method.

About a third of the lawn is done which also fills about a third of the green waste bin.

Darryl
Copyright 2015 - Darryl Musick
All Rights Reserved

The Grass Could Be Greener

This is the time of year my lawn looks its best. From about February to April is its peak. Last year, I tore up the dirt and seeded in a drought tolerant blend in November. This gave me an even longer lush looking lawn, from December to June, then the hot, drought afflicted summer months took its toll, making it hard and brown.

I still have one bag of seed left of that drought-tolerant mix (actually, not tolerant enough for our extremely hot summers). The weather forecast says we're about to get four days of free water courtesy of Mother Nature.

This is the perfect time to put that last bag in the spreader and overseed the lawn.

While the lawn is looking good, it still hosts of lot of weeds and sports a few bald spots where I dug some of those intruders up.  I take my spike tool and aerate those spots, giving the seed holes to take root in.

I go over the entire lawn twice, the bald spots get four passes with the spreader.

Seed spread, time to go in before the rain starts coming down. It may still be a drought but we should be getting at least twice as much water as last year.  

I'll be eager to see how long the lawn lasts this year.

Darryl
Copyright 2015 - Darryl Musick
All Rights Reserved

This Year's Feeding Schedule

My new lawn is looking a bit spotty in parts. Although it's still pumping up a lot of grass (with a lot of mowing), I think maybe the two weed 'n feed treatments might have given it a bit of indigestion.

I think it might be hungry but for food not laced with poison.

It's off to my friendly garden center to pick up some nitrogen-rich fertilizer.

The nurseryman there says I've got great timing. A rare rain shower is forecast tonight and putting fertilizer on your grass just ahead of the storm is the peak time to do it.

I load about three pounds into my feeder and shoot it out across the lawn.  Let's see if the grass likes it.

My lawn feeding schedule will be once a month for this season.

The other plants will be getting this liquid fertilizer.

Just dilute into a water pan and sprinkle on everything. This will happen every two weeks.

Hope the plants are happy with the food.

Darryl
Copyright 2014 - Darryl Musick
All Rights Reserved

The Grass is Not Greener...and That's a Good Thing

If you've been following the saga of our lawn, you know that last summer it was scorched earth. My neighbor has professional gardeners who care very well for her lawn and it is the envy of the neighborhood.

In the winter months, however, the St. Augustine goes a bit dormant. That's her lawn at the top of the post.

After all my work, my lawn has finally filled in and it actually greener that hers.  For once, the grass is not greener on the other side of the fence...that's the lawn before on the left and what it looks like now on the right. Keep in mind, these pictures were taken on New Year's Day in the middle of winter and, yes, our plants are affected by the cooler temperatures even here in California.

I'm very happy and satisfied with the seed I've sewn and how lush it has filled in (below is an Amazon link if you'd like to give it a try). It's supposed to be drought and heat tolerant so I'll be very interested in how it looks in 9 months after 3 months of extreme heat.

It's a mix of tall fescue, rye, and bluegrass that is supposed to be bred to send roots up to 4" deep. We'll see but, for now, it looks fantastic and I'm thinking of doing another overseeding once the cooler weather subsides.

Since I'm the Cheapskate, the price was right too. $20 for the grass seed and a lot of free sweat equity in aerating the lawn to prepare for it.

Darryl
Copyright 2014 - Darryl Musick
All Rights Reserved

The New Kid Gets its First Haircut

Now that the new grass seed has had a good four weeks to get established, I think it's time to give it its first trim so the neighbors don't think I've let my yard completely go.

With a month untouched, it seems weeds...like this dandelion...have taken over about 10 percent of the area.

I'll give the lawn a couple of good feedings, starting today and another one in a couple of weeks, with some winterizer fertilizer and see if the grass can crowd out the weeds. If not, I'll hit it with some weed and feed.

After I'm done, it's time to put the clippings in the green waste can and call it a day.

Darryl
Copyright 2013 - Darryl Musick
All Rights Reserved

A Lush Lawn?

Coming back from our little hiatus to update you on the big, fall lawn project.

After a couple of months of dethatching and aerating, I overseeded a couple of weeks ago, set the sprinkler timer to water three times a day at ten minutes each time, and left for Tennessee.

Gone for eleven days, I was anxious as to how the lawn would look when we returned.

As you can see from the picture above, the seeds have sprouted. They're not quite established to the point where I feel comfortable mowing them yet, so I will let them go another week or two before trimming.

It's looking promising. Here's the before picture...

...and here's the after picture.

Darryl
Copyright 2013 - Darryl Musick
All Rights Reserved