Why I Oughta...

I have some light-green colored (new) patches of grass in our backyard right now.  When I pull up a section of it, this is what it looks like below:  There is A LOT of root-structure at play, isn't there?  Is this a weed - like the dreaded Poa Annua?  Or...could this be Kentucky Blue Grass that I germinated and planted last year?  The color...of the patch (lime-ish green) has me worried that it is Poa. Any grass experts out there that can confirm what I'm dealing with here?  And, what I should do? One thought I had was to try an application of Tenacity?  It doesn't harm KBG and turf-type Tall Fescue .  So, it if does *anything* on this grass, that tells me it is Poa? 

This past season, I finally figured out that our backyard was infested with a warm-season grass/weed called Nimblewill and came up with a plan to treat it in place while not doing a full cool-season grass renovation.  That started with using a post-emergent spray called Tenacity  - which caused the Nimblewill to white-out and die .   Once that ran its course, I then began a project using a pre-germination seed technique followed by a project to overseed the lawn with a mix of Kentucky Blue Grass and Tall Fescue .  Which...after some watering... resulted in a bunch of new germination . And, while I was happy with the result in the Fall with new, green grass filling in plenty of bare spots, I knew the real, important results, would be visible once the lawn went totally dormant.  That's because, the Nimblewill is a warm-season grass and totally dies back once the temperature drops.  Which, historically have left us with a bunch of bare spots in the law...

Earlier this month, I was able to (finally and properly) identify that I have a creeping bentgrass problem in my backyard that includes a spreading (and concerning) amount of Nimblewill .  I decided to apply Tenacity as a post-emergent in an attempt to begin to control the grassy weed ahead of overseeding this Fall.  I mixed up a couple of gallons and applied it with a pump sprayer.   What does it look like after a week?  I'm seeing what I hoped to see:  some white emerging from the bentgrass.  See below for some photos showing the white tips.  Turns out, I have A TON Of creeping bentgrass back there that needs to go.  Look at all this white showing up: Everything I've read tells me that Nimblewill control isn't a one-shot deal.  It will take a few applications the first season and a multi-year treatment plan with herbicide control (Tenacity as a selective post-emergent).   But, so far...I'm happy.  And seeing signs of p...

Last week, I shared here on my lawn diary a little breakthrough.  For the past 18-or-so months, I've been watching a grassy weed creep along and begin to migrate from my far backyard to closer to our patio.  And, after reading about various grassy weeds, I came to the (initial) conclusion that I was dealing with Poa Annua - or an annual Bluegrass.  It was showing some of the signs like being lime green.  But, after observing the lawn this Spring, I noticed that the parts affected green'd up later and seemed to handle the Summer better than the balance of my Bluegrass.   I was planning on doing a complete renovation in the back by killing EVERYTHING off and starting from scratch with a new layer of seed this Fall.  As I prepared for that, I went in to see if I could learn more about what was back there and how much I *really* needed to kill off vs. just overseed. When I went in and pulled a mature stalk of grass, I discovered it had this sort of horizon...

 I've grown my lawn care practice in various ways over the years based on things I've learned from the Web (mostly YouTubers) including how I (now) cut my lawn pretty high (5 on the mower), have added Tall Fescue to our KBG lawn to try to provide it more heat resistance and even using a blue pattern spray in my herbicide treatments to 'see' where I've sprayed .  My most recent project is focused on controlling a new (to me) warm season weed grass called Nimblewill. In order to do that, I'm going to use a selective herbicide named Tenacity.  Tenacity seems like pretty great stuff and can be applied as either a pre-emergent or a post-emergent.  The difference is that you have to also use a surfactant if you're going the post-emergent route. For this Nimblewill control project, we're talking post-emergent and actively growing grass. That meant that I had to go find a surfactant.  The most readily available one was this Liquid Harvest version available on Am...

Yesterday, I posted about the lawn care breakthrough that I had in properly identifying and diagnosing our lawn with hosting a warm-season bent grass weed called Nimblewill .  In that post, I talked about trying to work my way through a process to both treat the Nimblewill, help some of our other tough spots and overseed the backyard this late Summer/early Fall. Back in March of this year, I posted my 2022 lawn care schedule and included the idea of a renovation in the back.  Turns out...(if you read yesterday's post on Nimblewill ), I don't have Poa and don't need a renovation.  I just need to remove the Nimblewill and overseed.  Here's how I'm approaching the process below. My plan starts with controlling the Nimblewill through a herbicide application.  Followed by aeration to part of my lawn then overseeding and finally amending parts of the backyard with compost to help improve the conditions.  I touched on some of this in my 2022 lawn schedule post fr...