I decided the shovel and rake method was too labor intensive so I purchased a Turfco that was in really poor condition and spent the entire winter on a complete restoration - down to every nut and bolt.





So far I have about 75% of the lawn done with one layer. I use 2NS sand (Michigan thing?). Approximately 3,000 lbs per load and I do it whenever I have a free morning and I'm bored.

 

That turfco! I need one.

 

Rad! Love a good winter project and love a good deal even more. Im in Coldwater, MI. What area are you in?

 

Im in Kalamazoo. It is nice to have but takes up a lot of real estate in a two car garage.

I was at 4" a couple of weeks ago. Then took it down .5" at a time to 2.5" over a period of about a week. It looked like garbage! Bad time of the year to do such a thing. There were a lot of clippings and brown tips even with sharp mower blades. Ended up having to bag it because there were so many clippings but at least it looked a little better.


Next few times I let it grow back out to 3" which is where I cut it today.



Looks good in the shade (camera/photo lighting)



No crab grass this year. I did two apps of dithiopyr/fertilizer on April 15 and May 15. Last year I didnt do preemergent and got hammered with crabgrass. But this photo is from Aug 25 so I guess the worst is yet to come.



Interesting comparison two photos from last year - June 11, 2018 before crabgrass and Aug 25, 2018 after crabgrass



I also aerated last year on June 14 which didnt help combined with no preemergent. I purchased a ride-on Classen Standaer and I wanted to badly to try it out even though timing was wrong. I sold it at the end of last year and now I am using a Ryan LawnAire 28.





I am also in the process of digging out around the sprinkler heads, and raising them up a little bit as well as replacing a few. I installed them below grade so they wouldn't get run over but I think this allowed dirt and debris to get in and ruin the gears. So I am going to try and keep the surrounding areas cleared out so it doesn't happen again.



Now giving the lawn a bit of water .1" and enjoying a Founders Centennial IPA while watching the sprinklers do their thing. Looks like approx. 2 week period with no rain. I watered a lot 2017 and got bad fungus. Last year 2018, I watered lightly each morning, enough to remove the guttation water in the morning and no big fungus issues. This year I am trying an approach of just giving it enough to keep from going dormant during dry periods.



Oh and here is my mower with homemade striping kit that I built a couple weeks ago.

 

I get great results from my tow aerator. Basically the same as a stand-on I rented a while back. Turf looks great. If you ever feel like bringing that topdresser down I'll make it worth your time.

 

Email me what you are thinking...my username at gmail.com.

Today I dug up clay/rocks around three sprinkler heads that were "stuck" and replaced the heads. Backfilled with sand again because the clay dirt is hard to pack well. Sand seems to backfill easily and hoping it will drain better around the sprinkler head. I have about three more to replace but I ran out of extra sprinkler heads. Will order online because local places charge 3x the price.

 

Now that I got my sprinkler system mostly working, I Set my Bhyve smart timer to refill daily. It will water about 3 hours each day approximately .17 inches per day. Its hot and dry out. I would do more water less often but I dont like the sprinklers running 6-9 hours per day. Let's see how this goes...

 

Mowed today 3.0" at a 3 day interval. Seems to be responding well the the irrigation. I don't remember the last time it rained here. I have a couple spots of Poa in this area you can see part of it in this photo.

 

Mowed at 3.0". Heat wave this weekend upper 90's.







Still have some clover. I sprayed Crossbow a couple weeks ago but didn't get it all. I'll try to hit them again when the temps cool.



I overseeded this area under the pine trees and let the existing grass grow very tall there. When I finally mowed it, it left brown stalks that won't go away. Been like this for a couple months. Any advice?





Brown strip near the property line. Not sure why.



Dry spots along the road and by the mailbox. I installed the sprinkler not in the corner so the mailbox wouldn't block the sprinkler but now that corner gets dry. How do other people deal with this situation?





Dead spot from fuel spillage and two dead spots from fertilizer (urea) spillage. Both a few weeks/month ago.





Poa I think... Do I just do a preemergent in this area in the fall?

 

Now that I got my sprinkler system mostly working, I Set my Bhyve smart timer to refill daily. It will water about 3 hours each day approximately .17 inches per day. Its hot and dry out. I would do more water less often but I dont like the sprinklers running 6-9 hours per day. Let's see how this goes...

It sounds like you're aware of this already, but the grass will do better (deeper roots, more disease resistance) if you irrigate less frequently, but more deeply each time. (Say .34 inches every 2nd day or 0.5 inches every 3rd day.) Yes, this will mean running the sprinklers longer. Personally, I have mine run from about 12:15am to 8:45am for their standard cycle on the 3rd day after a prior significant rain event or irrigation cycle.

 

Have you seen pics of ken-n-nancy lawn, i would take there advice.

 

Yes, I agree with you both.

Many people don't realize most household plumbing systems can only safely support a max flow rate of 6.5gpm (3/4" copper). Any more that that and the water velocity slowly erodes the insides of the pipes. My system is at about 8.5gpm just for the sprinklers...out of respect for the plumbing system, I try not to use any additional water at the same time. For example a water saving shower head at 2.5gpm combined with the irrigation would be almost double the max recommended flow (at least in the part of the system that is supplying both). Or a washing machine filling up- probably 5gpm added on to the 8.5gpm from the irrigation.

A long explanation to say that practicality outweighs the best practices for irrigating my lawn because I don't want my wife to be wondering if, when she can take a shower, run the dishwasher, laundry (new baby), etc... much easier to say don't use water between 4am and 7am.

I'm going to mow today. 3 days of growth in this pic with a lot of rain and no fertilizer for a few weeks.

 

3 days of growth



Losing the color after mowing



done - heres the good angle for stripes

 

A good day to do some sand topdressing with the cooler temps.

I get the sand from a local gravel pit. They have a $10 minimum charge and the sand is $5 per ton. This means I can fill my little trailer as much as want for $10.



The sand was a little bit wetter than I am used to. Must be from the heavy rain a couple days ago. I got 2800lbs (Less than usual. Not sure why. I just eyeball it how much based on the trailer leaf springs sagging)



Took just under two hours including getting out the equipment, getting the sand, spreading it, and putting everything away.

 

I'm jealous.

 

Thank you, sir

I did another 2,800 lb of sand today. This time I covered up my sprinkler heads with cling wrap to keep sand particles from getting inside and wrecking the plastic gears.



Also, I mowed. 3.0" hoc with two days in between mows. (Mowing every other day)



And here is a photo of the same spot in the backyard the day after topdressing. Sprinklers ran .2" last night, I raked some of the heavier areas, and mowed.

 

First off, I love the topdresser! After your initial investment of what must have been many hours of labor for the restoration, you have a tool that makes lawn-leveling a lot easier than for most -- particularly given your source for inexpensive high quality sand! Well done!

Dry spots along the road and by the mailbox. I installed the sprinkler not in the corner so the mailbox wouldn't block the sprinkler but now that corner gets dry. How do other people deal with this situation?

The area by the mailbox and road is always a challenge. We've been able to improve these areas in our lawn in the most recent few years. However, these options may not be available to everybody. Here's what worked for us (photo below):

• Like your situation, we also had trouble with the area near the mailbox where the sprinkler head at the mailbox can't get right into the corner. We ended up improving this by adjusting the two other sprinkler heads that throw back to the mailbox (the nearest head along the driveway and the nearest head along the road) so that they completely cover the corner, and actually throw a little farther onto the road and driveway. We're fortunate that our lawn is slightly *below* the driveway and road, so excess water thrown onto the road and driveway runs back into the lawn, rather than being lost into a storm sewer. Looks like you may have the added complication of the lawn in your mailbox corner being above the driveway and road, so this may not work for you.

• Before re-adjusting the sprinklers, we sometimes hand-watered the mailbox corner using a hose and spray nozzle. This worked best when the hand-watering was done at the first sign of drought stress (the grass kind of changes color and starts to look different), rather than waiting for the grass to go brown, at which point it's kind of too late. Although hand watering worked well, it was time-consuming, required us remembering to do it, and had to be done when it was needed, not necessarily when it was convenient for us.

• We changed grass types to one that would better tolerate the heat and drought. After switching to Kentucky bluegrass around the mailbox, that corner and section along the road does much better. We used to have a Northern mix there, for which the corner seemed to be largely fine fescue, which had the poorest heat and drought tolerance of the grasses in the Northern mix. In a section of our lawn where we still have a Northern mix along the road, the fine fescue still turns brown in the summer, whereas the KBG in the renovated front lawn deals much better with the heat.

For the section along the road, we always had trouble getting good grass to grow right to the edge of the asphalt. The last foot or so of soil is largely a sand/gravel mix to be part of the roadbed; salt runs off from the road in the winter and early spring; and the soil gets real hot there from the proximity of the asphalt. We eventually side-stepped the problem by intentionally making a "barren wasteland" from the road edge to a granite cobblestone border set back about 30 inches from the road, so that we can have good grass right up to the cobblestone border and then just have a barren wasteland (enforced by glyphosate) between the cobblestones and the road. It has worked well, but was a lot of work. There are pics in our reno thread from last year: https://thelawnforum.com/viewtopic.php?f=27&t=5671#p97955 and https://thelawnforum.com/viewtopic.php?f=27&t=5671#p97992 and https://thelawnforum.com/viewtopic.php?f=27&t=5671#p97994

Looks like your road edge may have an additional challenge of being sloped down from the road, yet the road may not fully drain onto your lawn. Your last six inches of turf abutting the road is going to be hard to water, as it's practically a ridge with water running off either into the lawn or back into a low spot on the road, rather than being retained at the road edge where it is most needed.

Have fun!

 

Have you ran anything else through the topdresser? I ask because assuming you could run something else, why always "just" the sand? No problem areas that would be served by topsoil/compost mix? It looks great man!

 

Have you ran anything else through the topdresser? I ask because assuming you could run something else, why always "just" the sand? No problem areas that would be served by topsoil/compost mix? It looks great man!

Im just not familiar with compost I guess. Is it any better than just hitting an area with urea? I did topsoil before but it cost over twice as much as the sand and I think it introduced weeds. compost is 3-4x more expensive than sand and I don't think it has leveling properties (correct me if I am wrong). I have pics of problem areas a few posts up. Do you have any recommendations?

Mowed today 3.0"...

 

I'm just not familiar with compost I guess. Is it any better than just hitting an area with urea? I did topsoil before but it cost over twice as much as the sand and I think it introduced weeds. compost is 3-4x more expensive than sand and I don't think it has leveling properties (correct me if I am wrong). I have pics of problem areas a few posts up. Do you have any recommendations?

Compost serves a different purpose than sand or urea. Compost is a good way to increase organic matter in the soil. It doesn't provide much nitrogen (like urea would) but usually contains a fair bit of phosporus. Compost does frequently bring in weed seeds, depending upon the quality of the compost source, which can vary all over depending upon specific location.

Compost does not help with long-term leveling, as being mostly organic material, will rot away to nothing after 3-4 years. In other words, if you fill in a hole with compost, the hole will gradually return again, until it is back to what it used to be after about 3-4 years.

Basically, sand, compost, and urea all serve different purposes, so it's not really a question of which one. However, it does seem that a topdresser could potentially make spreading compost a lot easier than with a spading fork and a rake.

 

Thanks for the info. I am hoping the fact that I am returning clippings this year will increase my organic matter. Last year I was removing 0.5 cubic yard + each week.

Day after a mow. The light spots are where the sun is poking through the trees or reflecting off windows.

 

I mowed 3.0" and applied fertilizer. I don't keep track of weighing it like I used to do but based on past experience it was about 1LB/1000. Supposed to get some good rain later today. I try to wait for rain because I also maintain an area adjacent to my property that is not irrigated.

 

I was more curious how the machine handled spreading compost / topsoil?

Compost can introduce weeds for sure and doesn't typically compact well enough to level anything out. It does have a lot more microbes than straight fert though. I have some bad soil areas I am am mending with a topsoil / compost mix and I always use Tenacity after spreading compost.

 

I haven't tried the turfco with topsoil or compost but I have no doubt it would work well.

The lawn responded nicely to the urea. I mowed today at 3.0". Maybe it is getting used to the 3.0" hoc since I have been doing that consistently for almost a month.

I think this is the best looking the lawn has been which is great for Aug 1. Would have been even better with a double cut but I ran out of daylight.

 

Mowed Friday night Aug 2.

Mowed today Aug 5.



Installed mulch plug. It seems to work fairly well. I purchased it for about $25 but not the rest of the kit and using the same blades for now. Also easier to see where you are actually mowing on the right side without the big discharge chute. Seems to keep the grass out of the landscaping beds a little better too.



Sharpened blades (prior to mowing) with 60 grit flap wheel.



Balanced blades with Magnamatic



My notsogood section under the pine trees is getting a little better.