I have a lawn with tall fescue grass. Basically I don't have too many
problems with my yard until about mid summer. Every year I notice that after
the summer's first real heat /humidity wave, some of the lawn, instead of
being nice and tall and thin, becomes more spread out and fat. Is this
normal or do I need to do something to my yard? (New Jersey)
1. Your fescue needs water, badly.
2. You have a nutsedge problem.
3. The "spread out and fat" grass isn't fescue. It's crabgrass (and from
the looks of it, both large and smooth varieties).
Never the less, you have posted a picture of crabgrass. It can grow
pretty fast. Perhaps you just missed it. For the nutsedge you can use
a product called Sledgehammer (used to be called Manage). If you have a
Lesco store locally you can buy it there, otherwise any real garden/seed
store (not Home Depot or Walmart) should carry it.
It will help the fescue that hasn't died yet, yes.
It's an invasive, perennial pest, that spreads by rhyzomes and tubers.
Google "Sedgehammer", for it's control.
It "can be" because it is. No sense in even trying to eliminate it now.
It's an annual, and by the time you manage it, it'll be dying anyway. You
say this happens "every year". Next year, try using a pre-emergent.
--
Eggs
A piece of motorway and piece of dual carriage way are enjoying a drink in
Just for the record, maybe I'm missing something, but in the pics he
provided, I don't see nutsedge, just crabgrass. Plus nutsedge occurs
with lots of water and high temps, so it's inconsistent with a lawn
that's dry.
For the crabgrass, next year, apply a pre-emergent at the proper time
in Spring. If you really want to get rid of what's there now, I'd
recommend Acclaim, but it isn't cheap. I've never found any of the
crabgrass control products sold in the typical retail channels to be
of much use.
It's there, man. It's just been mown. If you d/l the pic, and zoom in on
the lime-green areas, you'll see it. And, I've been digging up nutsedge
from some of the driest beds on the course, lately. Temps have been higher
than normal, here, but rainfall has been WAY below average. Sheesh, I hate
that plant!
Lonicera japonica used to be my "public enemy #1", but the last couple
years have changed that. It seems nutsedge is getting worse, every year. I
read that poison ivy is becoming more rampant, due to global warming. I'm
wondering how many more invasive species will follow suit. I'm sure
nutsedge is trying.
--
Eggs
I'm very responsible, when ever something goes wrong they always say i'm
Nope. You have have to treat the crabgrass. Watering will only help
the crab grass. Fescue is a cool season clump grass. It only grows
where a seed sprouted. It doesn't spread. Kill the crab grass and
overseed the fecsue in the fall.
Fescue is very hard to maintain. It requires alot of water (about 1 -
1.5 inches per week) and it will need to be overseedeed and aerated
yearly. 1.5 inches of water for 1000 SF of lawn is basically 1000
gallons of water. Thats alot of water and it's expensive. Assume a
sprinkler delivers 4 gallons per minuite. You have to water a
single 1000 sf section of lawn for over 4 hours to deliver 1.5" of
water.
Also, seeding Fescue like any other seed requires alot of work. It
needs to be watered several times daily. If the seed germinates and
is allowed to dry, it will die. It needs to be watered 4-5 or more
times daily. Not much. Just enough to keep it wet and growing.
After it is established and growing, 1" of water per week is plenty
until summer.
Never fertilize Fescue in summer. 2x per year (before Mar. 15. and
after Labor day).
It can be done, but you will have to Aerate and overseed yearly.
Yes, I'd like to see the source for fescue needing to be overseed
yearly. Or needing to be aerated yearly. Or needing a lot of
water? Or being hard to maintain? The fescues are recognized as
being relatvely low maintenance. Funny if fescues have those
characteristics how they are widely used in parks, athletic fields,
and sod production.
On Aug 17, 3:26 pm, snipped-for-privacy@optonline.net wrote:
Most Fesue is a hybrid. It doesn't produce seed. It is a cool season
clump grass. It germinates from seed and when it dies it dies. It
doesn't spread, hence the need to overseed.
It is sold as low maintenance and drought tolerant. It is somewhat
drought tolerant as it will go dormant. However, even dormant Fescue
needs water. If the grass does go dormant, when the rain comes, much
of it will not revive. Which means, it must be overseeded.
Bullshit. Where do you think the seed you plant, comes from? Even mown
fairly short, fescue produces seed.
So, you're assuming that noone waters their lawn, during periods of
little/no rain? All of the rough on our course is tall fescue. We've
*never* over-seeded any areas of established rough, in the time that I've
been working there (5+ years).
A properly maintained fescue lawn doesn't need to be over-seeded *every*
year, as you state. That's an absurd statement to make, and any credibility
you may have, goes right "out the window", if you stand by that statement.
--
Eggs
A flashlight is a case for holding dead batteries.
most likely from some seed selling catalog.
one of the really neat things about most turf types
is how they will actually produce their own seed and
reseed themselves if allowed by your local lawn gestapo
to grow tall enough..
I would submit that the first reference, which is part of
seedland.com, is a seed merchant that has an interest in selling more
seed by saying that you should overseed every year. And even they say
it's necessary for tall fescue, not all fescues.
The Texas Ext Service says:
"Many tall fescue lawns become thin after hot, dry summer conditions.
A thinned tall fescue lawn forms clumps and becomes unsightly. To
prevent this from occurring, it's usually necessary to overseed fescue
lawns in the fall."
"Although it grows best in moist environments, tall fescue has good
drought tolerance and will survive during dry periods in a dormant
state.....Tall fescue is well adapted to the "transition zone" of the
United States where summers are too hot and humid for cool season
grasses and winters too cold for warm season grasses. In the South,
tall fescue is best adapted to those states in the transition zone -
Oklahoma, Arkansas, Missouri, Tennessee, Kentucky, Virginia and
northern parts of North Carolina, Georgia and Texas."
So, this advice is coming from and targeted at a state where, per
their own advice, only part of the state is even suited for tall
fescue. And even then, it's at the very end of the zone appropriated
for tall fescue. And it assumes no irrigation during hot dry
summers. So, the summer conditions in TX without irrigation are
going to be vastly different than those of a lawn with irrigation in
CT. I wouldn't be surprised if you did have to overseed it many years
in TX without irriagtion. But that is different than telling
someone that all fescues need to be overseeded every year regardless
of climate or watering. I could show you dozens of agri ext services
that talk about and recommend fescues and don't say they need to be
overseeded every year. I'd also note that seedland.com is located
down south as well, FL I think?, so their advice and experience base
may be regionally affected as well.
Where do you live and what has your experience been? I've had tall
fescues as well as fine fescues, and shade tolerant varieties. My
experience has been that they don't need to be overseeded much more
than any other variety. For example, bluegrass can fill in through
rhizomes, however what usually happens is, there is an area that gets
shot from disease, insects, drought, whatever. And it's big enough
that it then needs to be seeded regardless of whether it's fescue or
bluegrass, because no one's going to wait for it to fill in.
So, my take is, I agree fescues are not going to fill in and self
repair like blue grass. But even clump grasses will grow larger to
fill some modest damaged spots. And from a practical standpoint, they
only have to be overseeded when significant damage has been done and
that shouldn't need to be every year.
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