st. augustine/bermuda

jsegura – posted 13 May 2008 14:54

I live in South Texas and I have a mixture of SA and bermuda in my back yard. My back yard faces south and is shaped like a backwards “7” for the most part (large side yard that faces west). My lawn is about 7 months old, I made the mistake of sodding it in November.. newbie here. And to make things worst I’ve learned I bought the grass from a company that has a bad rep. Well in the parts of my yard that get the most shade mostly from my house the SA is doing ok, few weeds and about 75 % SA. However in the area that gets quite a bit of sun, I’ve got more weeds and the grass is about 50% bermuda, perhaps this is just coincidence. Any way I know the best way to get SA to take over bermuda is to not cut it too short and less fertilizer perhaps. So if SA does better in shade, would it be a good idea to get some shade cloth and nail it to some ground stakes (longer ones if I can find them) and make a small canopy over the bermuda infested SA? Good this slow bermuda enough to allow the SA to choke it out? Thanks!

Alex_in_FL – posted 23 May 2008 07:58

You are thinking in the right direction but unless you plan to shade your yard all summer that approch is not likely to work.

You can use atrazine to kill the weeds. It will also stunt and kill some of the bermuda.