Want to plant cool-season grass? The clock is ticking
It’s time to plant vegetables and flowers in the cool season, as well as some lawn projects.
If you want to overseed your lawn with rye or other cool season grasses, time is running out. There are pros and cons associated with planting winter grasses over your Bermuda or St. Augustine. And there are more negatives than positives about littering zoysia.
In all cases, overseeding creates competition that harms summer grasses when they return in spring. But the look of green grass in winter can be very pleasant.
Ryegrass, fescue, clover and vetch can now be planted. In fact, it’s a bit late.
If you have bare soil that needs protection from erosion, or if you want to increase your vegetable production next summer, plant clover or vetch at 1 to 2 pounds per 1,000 square feet in loosened soil.
The best lawn oversaw grass is perennial ryegrass. What is sold as annual ryegrass is coarser and hangs around longer in spring. Scalp the summer grass and immediately plant the seed at 5 to 10 pounds per 1,000 square feet. Do not use fertilizer, especially corn gluten meal, until the small seedlings have grown up and growing so as not to interfere with seed germination.
Fescue can now also be planted. It’s a more permanent grass, but will usually suffer during our hot summers. Some gardeners successfully use it in shaded lawns. Forget the grasses and plant coverings such as ophiopogon, liriope, horse cabbage, Persian ivy, Asian jasmine or English ivy in strong shade, or simply use shredded mulch or gravel such as decomposed granite, basalt or lava rock.
If disease occurs in lawns, you may be watering or fertilizing too much. The nitrogen-rich synthetic fertilizers could definitely be the problem.
Many people make the mistake of leaving the daily watering cycle in the summer when shorter and cooler days begin – and that creates problems. Most landscape watering should now be done weekly or less frequently. If brown spots, gray leaf spot lesions, or the fading of all the spots are showing up, then applying whole ground cornmeal at 20 pounds per 1,000 square feet would be fine.
All types of solid sward can be successfully planted in the fall.(Howard Garrett / special article)
The leaves begin to show a little color and begin to fall a little bit of light. That goes without saying and is not a problem. Mow and mulch all kinds of leaves into the lawn. Grass clippings and leaves should never be bagged or sent to landfill.
Finally, it’s too late in the season to plant Bermuda grass and buffalo grass from seeds. It’s too late for St. Augustine and Zoysia too, but there are no seeds for that anyway. However, it is a good time to plant solid sward of any kind – summer grasses, as well as choosing the cool season of the year.
You can find more detailed information on these topics in my book Organic Lawn Care.
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