cebrowning – posted 10 February 2005 14:45
I have approximately 1,000 square feet of Empire Zoysia that generally receives full sun during the summertime. Unfortunately, the grass is not doing as well as I would like. I put the sod down in October of 2003. It grew well last summer, in fact in some areas it grew so quickly that I could not keep up with mowing it. The blades grew to over three inches. Once I was able to get back to cutting it, all I had was a patch of stalks with essentially no blades.
In another area, I got cut worms. They consumed about 15% of the lawn. Once I identified the problem, I applied a pesticide (which I was trying to avoid doing) which worked immediately. The majority of the area that was damaged by cut worms has begun to grow back. This area actually looks the best now because the blades are under 1 inch and green.
The question is, how do I get the other brown stalk like area that was growing so well to look like the area that was damaged by cut worms and has now grown back? Should I put the mower on the lowest setting and cut everything very low? A colleague of mine who used to work in the golf course industry mentioned verti-cutting. Is this an option? If have read that people used to burn Zoysia. However, I dont think my neighbors would appreciate this.
Other relevant information: I live in south east Florida I have well drained, deep sandy soils I water as needed, when the blades fold and look dryI fertilize with either malorganite or liquid fertilizer. I prefer not to use synthetics if possible.
Thoughts?
Craig
nbrebel – posted 06 March 2005 20:30
Well ….I feel you may be cutting the grass too low….never cut below 1.5 inches…think they say more than a 1/3 at a time or something like that….I got some zoysia but I live in the caribbean ….4 years now and I love it only problem I got is weeds cause I never got rid of them before I but in my first little pacth that is now really grown up…and well I have never addea dany fertilizer to them ….but will as soon as I figure out what and how to get out the weeds…