Have you personally adjusted your sprinklers to make sure they are getting those areas with water correctly?

 

I put the sprinklers in and made sure that the water was getting to all areas but with the move I hadn't had time to see what my rate of flow is so I've just been guessing on the time for how long to run a zone. I know typically zoysia needs 1" of water a week but i don't know if it should be more because it's new.

 

I put the sprinklers in and made sure that the water was getting to all areas but with the move I hadn't had time to see what my rate of flow is so I've just been guessing on the time for how long to run a zone. I know typically zoysia needs 1" of water a week but i don't know if it should be more because it's new.

I changed all my heads to the rain bird jet steams that I buy from HD. I get less loss to wind, and it is a more controlled application. I've had good luck with them as before even though I had even coverage, a bit of wind would change that dramatically.

 

My bet is it dried out. 3 x day on sod in high summer temps, full sun is what I'd like to see. Its been one week right?
If you lack Head to Head coverage ...it'll show when mother nature isn't contributing.
What spray tips ?

 

When you are putting down new sod, especially in south LA, you need to be watering ALOT more. I would water over an hour in the AM, and 15 min cycles throughout the day. SOAK it a ton tomorrow morning.

 

Correct it's only been a week. I've got rotary heads in the back and front yard. The areas on the side of the house and in front of the sidewalk are regular (fan?) style heads. What's throwing me off is that in some spots, it's brown around the sprinkler head which I would think would be where it would get the most water right? I talked to the guy who installed the sod and he says he thinks I'm watering too much at twice a day and suggested I bring it down to once every other day, but if I pull a piece of sod up, the dirt below seems dry, even an hour after watering. Jrich I'm gonna take your advice and soak each zone for 1 hour tomorrow morning. Is it ok if I run the sprinklers during the heat of the day? I read mixed things about that, some say don't, some say it's okay and Idk what to do. Lol

 

Correct it's only been a week. I've got rotary heads in the back and front yard. The areas on the side of the house and in front of the sidewalk are regular (fan?) style heads. What's throwing me off is that in some spots, it's brown around the sprinkler head which I would think would be where it would get the most water right? I talked to the guy who installed the sod and he says he thinks I'm watering too much at twice a day and suggested I bring it down to once every other day, but if I pull a piece of sod up, the dirt below seems dry, even an hour after watering. Jrich I'm gonna take your advice and soak each zone for 1 hour tomorrow morning. Is it ok if I run the sprinklers during the heat of the day? I read mixed things about that, some say don't, some say it's okay and Idk what to do. Lol

Here in the Dallas area I laid my Zeon Zoysa in June and I had to water 3x day for 20 minutes for the first several weeks. If I cut back it quickly started to turn so I would need to re-up it again. Even then I cut it back to 2x/day then 1/day and that process took like 6-8 weeks.

 

Running irrigation during middle of day and evening on established lawns is sub optimal.

New sod has no roots, you don't want it to dry out below the piece of sod. Supersod has a good blog of guidelines for caring for new installs -check it out.

Installer ...well, I'd not take any more input from.

 

Correct it's only been a week. I've got rotary heads in the back and front yard. The areas on the side of the house and in front of the sidewalk are regular (fan?) style heads. What's throwing me off is that in some spots, it's brown around the sprinkler head which I would think would be where it would get the most water right?

Not from my experience. It's the weak area and why head to head is ideal. For ex, you have a rectangle that is 10' tall and 100 yards long. Most installers will put out heads along one side that perhaps throw 12' and are spaced 12'. When it doesn't rain for weeks, the areas near heads are stressed

ideally there are sprays horizontal on the other side too, offset some, to provide overlapping coverage.

Rotor run time is probably 4x that of a typical fan type. Nothing better than some gauges to help dial it in - knowing how long to get 1/2 "

 

Thanks for all the help guys! I felt like I wasn't watering enough and you guys confirmed my thoughts were right.
I'm gonna soak it good in the morning tomorrow and adjust to more frequent waterings during the day.

jawhawk, what kind of gauges would i need to dial in how long to get 1/2"?

 

https://thelawnforum.com/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=45&hilit=Gauge

NRG 10 pack

1/2" is not a magic number but a reference point for easy math to compare.

To set expectations, the black is probably toast - anyone sell pieces there? Not all is lost, it'll eventually fill in and your lawn will be in another class

 

Thanks! I'm gonna get me a set of those. When they installed the sod, they ran out on the side of my yard so he ordered another pallet and is going to install the missing area during the week. I don't think the missing area will use up a whole pallet so ill just ask him to swap out the black areas with the leftover sod pieces.

 

I installed geo zoysia in June in Georgia and promptly went on a drought and it did the same thing but turned out just fine.
In my experience you want to water a lot all at once or twice daily when it's really fresh. Get the soil below the sod soaked and let the top dry out during the day. It makes the roots shoot to the soil under to get the water. It's nerve wracking letting it dry out up too but it'll be better off for it.
Here is June a couple weeks after install, then a month later and then a month after that in August.

 

jmyler, thanks for the tips!
Good to know that eventually it will green up with enough water.
Your yard looks beautiful!

 

Mine was installed in August of 2016. It looked okay at first, but then did exactly what yours is doing. The company that installed it said, "it'll green up next summer." Well, they were right. It looked very bad at times, but then came back in the summer. All the neighbors were surprised and I was surprised. The one issue that I had was weeds growing from between the squares. Since the edges didn't knit together very well, there were a lot of weeds to be pulled until everything was together.

 

We installed 11M of Palisades Zoysia about 3 months ago and watered it every day for the first 3 weeks. Even with that watering schedule, we had several areas of grass that died, so the installer came back and replaced that grass. In our case, with the grass coming from South Texas, as the heat rises those pieces they put on the top of the pallet upside down get blasted like a heat furnace on the trip and should be discarded.

 

We installed 11M of Palisades Zoysia about 3 months ago and watered it every day for the first 3 weeks. Even with that watering schedule, we had several areas of grass that died, so the installer came back and replaced that grass. In our case, with the grass coming from South Texas, as the heat rises those pieces they put on the top of the pallet upside down get blasted like a heat furnace on the trip and should be discarded.

Wow that's a really nice property.

 

@WDE46 Thanks!

 

Installed zenith zoysia on July 13th in NC. I was watering for around 45 minutes twice a day for the first two weeks (5AM and 12pm). I then backed down to 45 minutes once a day for a week or so, and now just water as needed. I never have measured the flow rates on my manual sprinklers, but just kept an eye on everything. I was moving a lot of sprinklers around, but it was worth it. Everything established well and is looking good now. It took approximately 10 days for the white roots to really start tacking down and I did my first mow after two weeks. I've been mowing 1-2 times per week ever since and everything is starting to look good and most of the seams between sod rolls have filled in.

Good luck!

 

We installed 11M of Palisades Zoysia about 3 months ago and watered it every day for the first 3 weeks. Even with that watering schedule, we had several areas of grass that died, so the installer came back and replaced that grass. In our case, with the grass coming from South Texas, as the heat rises those pieces they put on the top of the pallet upside down get blasted like a heat furnace on the trip and should be discarded.

That looks really good! How is it handling the shade? I installed Zorro in May and in the areas that are most shaded I am seeing thinning already. It is probably not all as a result of the shade as I have fought a little bit of fungus, etc.

 

@SC Grass Loon So far so good....I love this grass!

 

@SC Grass Loon So far so good....I love this grass!

That is great, it sure looks good. I hoping with better management I can thicken up the shaded areas of my lawn.

 

So update. Sorry no pics, Ive been working crazy hours but I'll try to take some tommorow morning. You guys have some beautiful lawns and Thanks to everyone for the helpful hints and suggestions. I've been watering heavy in the morning and a medium watering around 1:00 everyday. Some of the dormant and burnt spots have started to show signs of green. The sod layer came and finished my side yard today and the extra sod he had left he replaced some of the burnt out patches. Turns out I don't have Emerald Zoysia, I have Geo Zoysia because the sod farm sent the wrong grass from the start. I don't mind as when it arrived it was a beautiful dark green so as long as I know it will eventually return to that color I'm cool with that. I read that Geo needs 1" of water a day untill it's established so that totally makes since why everything was drying out, especially with the heat. I still need to move a few sprinkler heads and push some under the grass layer and I plan to do that this weekend. Another question for you guys is I seem to have a lot of ants and some roaches around the yard from the new flower beds and sod. Can I put anything like granules out yet on the sod to help with bugs or is it too early? This Saturday will be two weeks from the initial install.

 

Finnaly some update pics. I think we are supposed to get some rain next week so that should help some with the heat. Is it too early to use a lawn roller? When they sodded they didn't do the best job of keeping things flat. I'm sure over time and rain should help things some. Just trying to speed up the process.

 

If you're using the water-filled tub style (instead of the heavier self-propelled ones that professionals use) then don't expect any major impact on uneven ground (such as ruts from footprints, etc). It's just not enough weight to compress dirt. I read somewhere (super sod?) that it helps to compress the sod into the soil for a better root/soil contact and that's where that plastic tub comes in handy.

As for the ants/bugs - Fipronil is the active ingredient in products such as Termidor SC or Taurus SC, and can be sprayed anytime. It's a termiticide and not a contact chemical meaning insects won't die on contact but instead take it back to the colonies when walking through it. (the other alternative is Advison fire ant granules, which the ants treat as food and scurry back with them to feed the queen. Voila!).