Category: Establishment

Establishment of turfgrass can be starting a new lawn from seed, renovating a golf course fairway, or patching sod into a worn out soccer goal mouth. Four kinds of planting units are available for propagating and planting different turfgrass species: seed, sprigs, plugs, and sod.

Each turfgrass species has an inherent growth rate and capability to transplant, colonize bare ground, or propagate in trays or a nursery. The fastest, common bermudagrass, Cynodon dactylon, has a relative growth rate of 9% per day. With that high exponential growth rate, planting in an ideal growing environment (sun, fertilizer, water, no weeds) a square meter of bermudagrass could theoretically, with frequent redivision and replanting of vegetative cuttings, cover half the land area of the earth in one year. Environmental conditions are generally not ideal.

There are seven basic steps in establishing turfgrass. Not every step is required in every situation, but generally all steps must proceed in this specific order, with the mnemonic P-E-G-I-S-I-D:

(1) Plan what kind of turfgrass to plant and why; (2) Eradicate perennial weeds; (3) Grade, remove buried debris; (4) Install irrigation; (5) Seedbed preparation, a smooth grading; (6) Install turf; and (7) Defend against pests and environmental stress.