Looking for some advice about my lawn has i have little experience. We moved into this house recently and would like to have a nice lawn. We live in west texas, so it's hot and dry. The garden receives very little shade as we're south facing.

I'm attaching an image to show it's current condition. Apparantly the soil is pretty decent for this area. All i've really done so far is kill off most of the weeds. Should we be starting anew, tilling etc? Thanks.

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kp42484

Hi,

I'm not an expert, but I used to live in El Paso, TX, and our lawn was in about the same shape as yours since we lived in the desert! What helped was that I actually had to go and plant grass seed. Our watering times were rationed, but when we were allowed to water the lawn (using sprinklers), we did. We watered it like crazy and sowed grass seed every week or so. To sow the seed, we bought one of those things that look like wheelbarrows. You put th seed in it, and push it, and it distributes the seed as you push it (sorry I don't know the name).

The lawn improved, but the hot sun made for some weak grass because in El Paso, it's sunny all the time. Our neighbors straight out bought some premade turf and laid it, then watered it like crazy. Their lawn was the greenest lawn in the neighborhood, although I can't tell you what they used as turf!

Hope this helps!

revert

Thanks for the reply. I already have a hybrid Bermuda grass ready and the spreader you mentioned. I guess really what i need to know is should i hire a tiller and til the whole area? When would be best time to start seeding? It's hot here right now, 80 degress but these temps aren't stable at this time of year so the temp may drop back.

kp42484

It depends on where you live as to when you start seeding; kind of like planting anything else. Usually the package of seeds tells you when to plant depending on the region you live in. We started about the early fall, and personally I think one should start in the spring before it gets too too hot. I don't know exactly where you live, but for us it was cool winters and scorching summers, so we started in-between when the temps weren't in any extreme.

I wouldn't hire any tiller. Well, we didn't and it was okay. Some little spreaders (thanks for the word ) have spikey wheels so that when you push it, it makes little shallow trenches. But I don't think it makes much of a difference to till or not, especially because it looks like you need to fill in holes/patches of soil, not a totally bare lawn. A good website is: outsidepride.com

dlochart

You don't need a tiller necessarily but you have to break up the topsoil in some fashion. You can rent a lawn comber or go buy a manual lawn dethatcher/comber (looks like a rake with crescent shaped blades at the end.) If you don't intend on putting down new lawn soil then you will have to do the work to make your topsoil soft (aerated) so the roots have a place to go. What we did was manually comb the soil and then put down 1 to 1.5 inches of a good lawn soil then spread our seed and then cover it with 1/4-1/2 inch of more lawn soil. It worked great. Now we have a small yard (townhome) so if it was bigger I might want some assistance (tool rental) As for time of year I cannot help you. I live in Maryland and you have to plant new lawns in either October or March here.

Also do not fertilize the seed until after 4 weeks of putting it down and water a little everyday.

best of luck

Doug

revert

Thanks for all the help. I guess i'm just going to break up the soil in the patches where there's no grass.