Inland So. Calif lawn

RmebrPuntaBanda1@hotmail. – posted 06 March 2004 11:33

I live just below the foothills of the San Bernardino Mts. in So. California. We have very dry hot summers and cool winters. My lawn is presently a mixture of bermuda, St Augustine, fescue and oxalis. It is an old neighborhood, hence the mixture of grasses. My husband wants to tear out the existing lawn and put in zoyzia grass and I just want to kill the weeds and continue reseeding with fescue in the summer and winter rye in the winter. What would be the advantages of either, besides the obvious work of tearing out the old and leveling the area.

tommy – posted 10 March 2004 13:29

It sounds like you have a decent lawn going…….so maybe continue what you have! Zoysia will mean a lot less mowing, but you will have to make sure everything is killed off before you re-plant with zoysia! What that means is spraying ’round up’ twice- about 6 weeks apart. The first spray will not kill everything…..especially the bermuda.

Dchall_San_Antonio – posted 15 March 2004 09:32

Besides the obvious work of starting over again, you have the obvious cost. If cost is no object, then you might go ahead and do the zoysia.

I never like to restart a lawn. I like to think that proper lawn care will give you what you want with minimial work/cost. Here are my three steps to great lawns.

1. Water deeply and infrequently. Deeply means at least an hour in every zone, all at once. Infrequently means monthly during the cool months and no more than weekly during the hottest part of summer. If your grass looks dry before the month/week is up, water longer next time. Deep watering grows deep, drought resistant roots. Infrequent watering allows the top layer of soil to dry completely which kills off many shallow rooted weeds.

2. Mow at the highest setting on your mower. Most grasses are the most dense when mowed tall. Bermuda, centipede, and bent grasses are the most dense when mowed at the lowest setting on your mower. Dense grass shades out weeds and uses less water when tall. Dense grass feeds the deep roots you’re developing in 1 above.

3. Fertilize regularly. I fertilize 4 times per year using organic fertilizer. Which fertilizer you use is much less imporant than numbers 1 and 2 above.

By the way, I grew up in Riverside and know what you have in the way of weather and soil conditions. If I were you, I would try to favor the bermuda by mowing as low as possible. For now the oxalis is a problem. You might think about spot spraying the oxalis to kill it out. Then the bermuda will have a chance. If you get a reel type mower, that works best on low growing grasses. When you mow bermuda low, it takes on a different growth habit. It will start to grow horizontally instead of vertically. The horizontal bermuda is so different you will think you have a different kind of grass growing. It is very soft underfoot and very dense. Some people mow their bermuda to 1/16 of an inch high, but anything below one inch will work for you.