3 acre bermuda lawn in Dallas help

jasonphillipstx – posted 26 February 2005 16:54

I just moved to a home on 3 acres and I want at least 1 acre to look very nice. I have bermuda, but the house was empty for the entire summer last year before I bought in is November. It was mowed with a large tractor when the grass got very high and there is a significant amount of old clippings(thatch?) on embedded in about 1/2 acre of it. I was thinking to get one of those Brinly dethatchers to removed the old grass, then aerate it with a brinly tow behind core aerator before I put out some pre-emergent and fertilizer. I have never taken care of my previous lawns myself and would appreciate some advice on how to get this lawn looking great. Thanks in advance.

ted – posted 26 February 2005 18:11

i would just clean it up first with raking and mowing, then see what you have- sounds like it’s pretty rough with being mowing with a tractor. i would skip the home depot aerator deal, i don’t think it’s going to be a quality piece of equipment to invest in. you can rent something cheaper and better. as for the pre-em and fert., hit it with the fert. hard and heavy beginning in about a month or whenever it starts to green up in your market. see if you can get some Lesco products in Dallas, you might be able to pull it off, even being a homeowner. also you might try some farm or ag supply co-ops- they carry some fairly identical products to pro products. i’m down the road from you in Houston, so i kind of know what’s going on in your market.

jasonphillipstx – posted 28 February 2005 07:30

I actually tried the Brinly Plug Aerator from home depot on about 1 acre after a rain. It worked very well.

einstein3018 – posted 28 February 2005 14:23

I garden organically.(no Im not a hippy) I would think that you could toss out either chemical or organic(corn meal $6.00 per 50lbs) fertilizer and it would probably aid greatly in turning all of the carbon based residue in your yard to composte. I would think you are in great shape. I think your better off than someone with a bare desert for a lawn. Just my opinion though.

ted – posted 28 February 2005 16:47

sounds like you’ve already bought one! yeah, for the price involved and the quality of the product for long term use, i would still use a rental unit. the bottom line: if you do some checking around, you can find pro type products and equipment for use on your lawn, and do it cheaper and better than the hardware stores.

turfman – posted 09 March 2005 08:05

no need to re-seed, if you have bermuda——–in tx, then you have a winner. go with it and plant perrinal rye in the fall to maintain the green.good luck with the bailing!