[OnyxsLawn]

The Nuclear Option part 2:

Despite the advise of everyone around me I've decided to kill off my front yard this fall. I did the back this spring with good success and learned a lot. However, the front reno will be a lot more work as I am going to have to do a lot of leveling and will also be installing an in-ground sprinkler system. I wasn't going to go with a low mown bluegrass but after hanging out on here too much I gave it a good consideration. The kicker was watching one of Ward's kids riding a dirt bike on his front lawn without it getting damaged. That's the kind of thick turf I wanted.

Here are my plans in exhaustive detail.

1. Soil test (sent 6/22)
2. Round up 7/12
3. Scalp
4. Round up again 7/20
5. Cut sod out; rental -$110
a. Need to lower the grade to match the hardscapes
6. Install sprinklers
7. Edging ~110ft
8. Level and roll
9. Round up again 8/10
a. Planning on adding 1-2" of compost to the sandy soil.
10. Soil amendments- Milorganite, humic acid, others as needed. Anything else?
a. N-Ext RGS- can be applied to seedlings? At seed down?
b. Any lime needs to go down 2 weeks before seed
11. Seed down 8/13 10lb Seed- 30% bluenote 30% Skye 20% Midnight 20% Everest $131 from SSS
a. Chosen mainly for vigor and disease resistance. Better spring green up and color will be a plus after our long, white winters. Any suggestions on these cultivars?
b. Drew is also sending some samples of each individual cultivar so I can do some testing with them.
12. Pre-M: Scotts starter + mesotrione
a. Do I need to reapply 30 days later?
13. Seed cover- peat moss and cover grow
a. Do you seed more shallow when using a cover mulch?

Irrigation Plans: $515
Tree Lawn
6 Hunter pros-04-prs40 4in bodies
2 Mp-lcs-515
2 Mp-rcs-515
2 Mp-ss-530

Main Yard
6 Hunter pros-04-prs40 4in bodies
3 Hunter MP300090
2 Hunter MP200090

L Strip
4 Hunter pros-04-prs40 4in bodies
2 Mp-lcs-515
1 Mp-rcs-515
1 Mp-ss-530

Driveway Strip
4 Hunter pros-04-prs40 4in bodies
1 Mp-lcs-515
1 Mp-rcs-515
2 Mp-ss-530

Other
HR-2HRP-PUSH Hydro Rain 2 Push Fit Manifold System
Hunter xc400-I or orbit 57946 B-hyve
300 ft 3/4"tubing
100 ft ½" tubing
Blu-loc fittings



This design should give me even head to head coverage with matched precipitation
I went through and calculated the flow rates for each of the 2 zones to make sure my supply could handle it. I also calculated the cost of running the system



Post emergent Fertilization and control:
First mow- Wait till 3" then work it down or start them low so they never know what it feels like to be tall?
Tenacity, 2,4-D, and/or Triclopyr ~day 45
0.2 lb/K N from 29-0-5 or milo weekly until Nov
Winterizer 1lb/k after the last regular season ND game

Spring 2019:
Prodiamine
Plug gaps
Start feeding 0.2lbs/k/week once soil temps hit 55 and continue until soil temp 75
PGR
0.5lb/k/2 weeks milorganite until soil temp drops to 70

Updates:
Water tests: 65psi and 7 gpm so that's good!

Some Pics and soil test to come

 

[OnyxsLawn]

Long before:



Before:

 

[g-man]

This looks like a really solid plan. I'm looking forward to this. Your current lawn looks great. A few comments:

- I would start sprinklers now and uses them to keep the lawn irrigated during the round up phase. It sounds backwards, but you want the grass/weeds growing and not dormant so you could kill them. Also it is easy to underestimate the amount of time it takes to install the pipes.

- in the tree lawn (close to the street). I would not use the strips for a 8ft distance. Their max is 5ft. To keep it at the same rate, I would use the MP1000 on a PS30. Page 8 of this guide has how to place the strips for your other areas.

- I need to think about the main area with the tree/mulch area. I think it might overwater the tree. Do you plan to keep the tree/mulch? Rectangles (40 x 30) makes it challenge with irrigation that wants squares. Im thinking on 15ft distances to make it even precipitation. How close is the car drive way with the mini van to the heads location?

- get the seed at hand before round up. Sometimes they run out.

- Purdue recommends mowing at 1.5in at first to encourage filling. A push reel from craigslist is nice for these first few cuts. Establishing Turfgrass Areas From Seed

 

[OnyxsLawn]

This looks like a really solid plan. I'm looking forward to this. Your current lawn looks great. A few comments:

- I would start sprinklers now and uses them to keep the lawn irrigated during the round up phase. It sounds backwards, but you want the grass/weeds growing and not dormant so you could kill them. Also it is easy to underestimate the amount of time it takes to install the pipes.

I've still got my crappy impacts set up even though I haven't had to use them this year. Just give it a thorough soaking a few days prior to killing? throw some cheap fert down to push the growth first?
Here's my lawn calendar for the timing of all of the work:

- in the tree lawn (close to the street). I would not use the strips for a 8ft distance. Their max is 5ft. To keep it at the same rate, I would use the MP1000 on a PS30. Page 8 of this guide has how to place the strips for your other areas.

- I need to think about the main area with the tree/mulch area. I think it might overwater the tree. Do you plan to keep the tree/mulch? Rectangles (40 x 30) makes it challenge with irrigation that wants squares. Im thinking on 15ft distances to make it even precipitation. How close is the car drive way with the mini van to the heads location?

For the tree lawn I switched to the strip rotators just to save on costs probably is best to go back to my original plan (well probably iteration 5 or 6, see below) which was the mp1000 on the ps30. Think these should be on their own zone or will they match fine with the other strip?

The massive mulch bed around the crabapple is going to get brought in by about 3ft diameter. I thought trees usually sucked up more water than the surrounding areas? I also originally went with 15ft spray but cut back to 2 20s and 4 30s to cut back on costs a bit. At ~$10 a sprinkler it adds up quick. I have about 5 feet between my property and the neighbors drive.

- get the seed at hand before round up. Sometimes they run out.

- Purdue recommends mowing at 1.5in at first to encourage filling. A push reel from craigslist is nice for these first few cuts. Establishing Turfgrass Areas From Seed

copy that. Ordering seed today.

 

[OnyxsLawn]

Seed came in yesterday from SSS 10lb of my mix and Drew also through in some extra of the individual cultivars so I can do some testing and see how the individual ones perform. Wish I was home to plant some plugs but we're on vacation for the next week.

 

[OnyxsLawn]

Soil test came back. everything looks decent except a little low on k and a little high on p. pretty easy to fix. pH looks great which was a surprise. overall not too worried. the compost i've been using is a different story so I started its own thread.

 

[g-man]

This looks good. CEC of 11 and almost 4% of OM. I would use SOP (0-0-50) instead of MOP (0-0-60) and use AS instead of urea since it is close to 7.0. Other than that, it is great lawn growing soil.

 

[OnyxsLawn]

When your lawn is dead and still barely getting dominated by the neighbors...



Anyways, 2 rounds of glyphosate down a week apart got a pretty good kill. Sod is coming out to level everything down sometime next week.

Plugs were planted 8 days ago and already have almost everything germinating. Used 3"x3" plug trays to match my 3" plugging tool


Midnight was the first up followed by Everest then skye and finally bluenote has very little germination yet. This is surprising as based on the NTEP trials I would've expected Bluenote to be up first. It may have to do with where each tray is under the sprinkler head.

 

[OnyxsLawn]

Started cutting out the sod tonight after work. Got it all cut and have just started rolling it up. Had to cut down almost 2.5" on the tree lawn to get it close to level with the concrete. I can now see why my OM is so high. lots of dead, decomposing roots in the soil from the old pine tree that used to be in the front yard.

 

[OnyxsLawn]

The old grass is all out and ready for sprinkler install and leveling. ended up taking out more than 6" in some areas with the tractor to bring it down to the rough level of the concrete

 

[OnyxsLawn]

The irrigation system and the leveling work was finished earlier this week so seed finally went down last night at about 5lb for 1500 sqft with scotts starter milo and peat moss. Bought myself a roller which helps a ton with keeping the seed in place with the rain we got last night. The only problem is that there is a stray cat using my nice level lawn as a litter box. any ideas how to keep pests out?

pics are before the seed went down i'll take some more tonight. fingers crossed for good germination!

 

[Budstl]

Great thread dude. You put in some work. I'll be interested to see the pots. How many bales of peat did you use?

 

[ericgautier]

Nice work! Looking forward to the progress.

 

[OnyxsLawn]

Thanks guys!

Day 0- Seed down with 3.5 3 cuft bales of peat moss covering





The plugs are 37 days old and doing well. the Bluenote plugs are finally taking off. Im pretty sure they just got washed out because of their position under my crappy old sprinkler. I've got a spare mp rotor body I mounted on the stake from a impact that I'm just waiting on another nozzle from SprinklerWarehouse to show up (always waiting on them).





Everyone says to put down KBG seed light and let it spread. Here is the proof:



The bottom right most 2 plugs were planted with as few seeds as a could get, the rest i just threw it down. The thinner seedlings are already on to their 3rd or 4th leaves while the rest have maybe 2. Now I'm worried i went too heavy with my seed on the front.

I also want to show progress of my Rose of Sharon transplant project. The bush came from a friend of my mom's so I decided to try to do something fun with it cause it was free and I wasn't attached to it yet. I trimmed it way back to the 3 best shoots I could and braided them. I'm going to keep it is a little tree rather than a full bush. It currently is struggling and was down to 2 leaves that were left green. its starting to put out some more finally to hopefully I didn't completely kill it. Time will tell.

 

[OnyxsLawn]

I didn't sleep well listening to the thunderstorm wash away my yard. It wasn't as strong as some people in the area got but still about an inch overnight into already saturated soil. I went out this morning to assess the damage and it wasn't too bad just a few areas washed out.





But when I looked closer in the areas without peat moss I found grass babies popping up! 5 days for germination is pretty good in my book.

 

[STL]

@OnyxsLawn congrats on the germination!

For plots/plugs, have you considered bottom watering? It works really well, especially after germination, and promotes deep roots. It's easier to manage than top watering too ime.

 

[OnyxsLawn]

bottom watering? as in just leave the plugs in a tray of water? I have trays but left them out because I didn't want them to sit in a pool of water.
I just planted a second round of plugs so the sprinkler is on seedling mode again but I will need a good way of watering them once I move the farm indoors for winter.

 

[wardconnor]

@OnyxsLawn

Check out this article about seeding KBG. I look forward to seeing your progress. You have put a ton of work in. It is going to look nice.

http://sturf.lib.msu.edu/article/2009apr58.pdf

 

[STL]

@OnyxsLawn yes, bottom watering via a tray with some water that you refill as needed. Check out this article from ATY for some basics. I've done it twice now and it works well. I typically use flexible 6inch plastic pots but did some 12inch too.

https://aroundtheyard.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=162:growing-sod-in-pots&catid=9&Itemid=117

 

[OnyxsLawn]

@wardconnor Good read, glad to know i can keep the tenacity down heavy until the 60 day mark when i can put down some prodiamine. I plan on spraying 0.5lbs N/k from urea to feed starting around 4 weeks old to push it to establish, however it looks like its coming in pretty thick.

@STL i wish my plugs looked that full at 5 weeks. Going to fertilize today and put the old set in trays to get the roots stretching so i can plant in 2-3 weeks. Thoughts on the depth of the 6" pots vs my low trays affecting how much water they can take in the tray?