I don't have personal experience with it but I have been reading here for years. According to the collected wisdom of the ages here, as interpreted by me, you goofed. You goofed especially hard on picking a time to renovate and you goofed in the process. However, it's only grass and dirt.

Welcome to GardenWeb. Had you asked before you started doing the work, we might have been able to save you a lot of work and a future of pain and suffering.

Jumping ahead to the fertilizer first, chemical fertilizers only work on roots. Since you have no roots, what are they thinking???? If you want to use chemical fertilizer, any low nitrogen fertilizer will do. 40 pounds per 1,000 seems freakin' exorbitant to me, especially for chemicals. I'm the last person to be commenting on chemical fertilizers, but don't they usually apply more like 10 pounds per 5,000 square feet. Could they have suggesting an organic fertilizer? That's even a little heavier than most organic fertilizers go down, but at least I would not call it exorbitant.

If we really want to tune up some replies for you, we need to know a couple things...

Are you in the WA rain forest or the WA desert?

Why did you kill the grass? Do you have something in mind that the former turf had become an obstacle? What do you plan to do with the yard (play on it, look at it, dog yard, etc.)?

The grass clumps are absolutely going to be a problem for the reason you have discerned. When they get tilled in, they decompose to leave a void in the soil which leads to holes and bumps. But the fact that you tilled the soil is going to give you bumps anyway because soil does not settle the same all across your lawn. If you did not have the grass mixed in I would have had a suggestion for that, but with the grass you are facing a three-year spiral to an awful surface. It takes 3 years for "normally" tilled soil to settle into the bumps it would get.

The proper tool to resurface a lawn is a tractor with a box blade. Had you consulted with a landscaper first and then decided to kill the grass anyway, the landscaper would have brought in a tractor and box blade, scraped the grass off the top, and been finished in the same morning. You would have been left with a surface of soil ready to plant. If you needed additional soil or regrading to ensure proper water flow away from buildings, he would have done that at the same time. The reason I'm saying this now, even though it is too late for you, in three years you're going to want to smooth out the lawn. This is the way to do it if you are having it done professionally. If you want to do it yourself, there is a FAQ on that topic on one of these lawn forums.

Or, if you want to pull out all the grass clumps now and get after it, you can. If that is your plan, you need another tool. You need a drag. I made a drag out of chain link fence, a 2x6 about 6 feet long, and 40 pound bag of soil for weight. The fence goes on the ground first, then the 2x6 on top of the fence, then the weight on top of the board. Drag the fence behind you to level out the soil. Once you have that tool, here's how you level it.

1. Drag it smooth, not necessarily flat because you might want some rolling surface to add interest.
2. Water it down for a day. Really soak it but don't let any water run off. If it starts to run off, stop watering, let it soak in for 30 minutes, and start watering again. You need it pretty wet all the way through all the tilled soil to settle it.
3. Let it dry at the surface and drag it again.
4. Water again.
5. Drag again. This is the final drag so be sure it is exactly as level as you want it and matches all the borders where you want the level to be. The soil level will rise some with the growth of roots and microbes in it, but at least that will be a more uniform arising.

This could take days just for these steps, but it will get you the surface you want.

As far as timing goes, fall is the best time to seed. If you can put sod down now, that will be the only way to really avoid crabgrass. And if you are in the desert, you have a little more heat to deal with than the coastal part of the state. Spring grass doesn't have time to 'harden off' before the summer heat and you will lose much of it to heat. That is okay. You can reseed again in the fall.

Please answer my questions above so we can help you choose a grass and put it down.

My computer crashed before I posted the above reply so I came back to see if it posted. Interesting that it did. Hmmmm.

Anyway, I like philes reply better than mine. Mine is alarming. His is calm. Go with calm. Exhale, close your eyes, and chant "nom myoho rengay qyo" over and over. Ignore the soil test (my favorite suggestion of all time) and ignore the grass clumps. Happy things will happen and you can take care of them as time goes on. Yes, I'm serious about relaxing and I was too serious in my first reply. Keep an eye on this forum and learn from the successes and mistakes other people make.

DCHall and I agree. I hope that you're over 40, and I hope you have children, or you might not fully appreciate the effort (ours, not yours. )

...."Dad, I already bought the car.".....

Oh. Well, in that case, I won't go into 'how to buy a car', and I won't go into that I'm that much older than you, have done this several times, etc, etc.

No. If you've already bought the car, I will smile. I will also, you know I will, say 'Nice Car'.....

Good luck with it. And keep us posted. We dads don't like being kept out of the loop.

You guys are great! Thanks for the replies. I just ran across this site, and am now addicted!

This has been a year long process, and I have been wondering what the heck (and why the heck) I am doing every step of the way.

For the past 4 years I have been doing everything I could think of to create an adequate yard. By adequate, I would settle for somewhat green. We are in the seattle area so this seems like it would be an easy task.

Our yard had a pretty good slope to it, and I could not get water into the ground at all (tried multiple aerations, thatching, use of product to treat what I considered to be hydrophobic soil (very hard, yet powdery at times, and water would just bead up on it and roll off)). So finally I decided it was time for a retaining wall (primarily to level some of the yard), so the 150ft long by 4 ft high wall went up. That managed to bury a portion of the current yard. As the dump trucks were driving across the yard to dump fill dirt, they didn't even leave impressions, so that led me to think that the ground needed loosened up some way. That is what led me down the road of incorporating some better soil and tilling in. The fact that I was going to till led me to the point of "might as well install a sprinkler system while I am at it", so, that is on the agenda before throwing the seed down.

The yard is extremely high traffic by the neighborhood kids. All day football or baseball games is pretty typical. That is what led to trying to level some of the yard. We have a large yard, and love the fact that it can bring the kids together.

My goal is a green yard that does not turn to dried out straw in the summer.

Now of course, I look at pictures of the yard before I started everything and think, hmm, that wasn't so bad!

Below are some pics from last summer that might give you a better idea of what I am working with. Bottom line is that I have had a great time working out there (yes, frustrating at times), and have realized I have a love for yard/gardens, and can't wait to learn more and more (thus the new addiction to this site.)

Here is a link that might be useful: Yard Pictures

You are easily addicted. Be careful of making this more than a hobby. You can actually love a lawn to death pretty easily by getting caught up in the overapplication of the right chemicals and then trying to compensate for it. If you think you might fall into that trap, you might look into organic lawn care. There is a FAQ for that over on the Organic Gardening forum, and there is an Organic Lawn forum, too. It is very hard to do anything so wrong that grass dies with the organic approach. Cost is about the same depending on what issues you might have had prior to trying organics.

What kind of grass had you been thinking about putting in? I'm thinking blends of fescues and bluegrasses. Fescues are bunch grass that does not spread. Bluegrass is a sod-forming grass that does spread. With a blend like that the area between the fescue plantlets will have grass. If you lose some fescue plants, the bluegrass will fill. Having a blend of seeds helps ensure that you do not get burned by falling in love with one seed that happens to not work in your soil/area.

...and Welcome Aboard....

Spent the majority of the weekend raking the dirt, which led to piles of the old chopped up sod. So, I probably removed 3/4 of the remains of the old grass. The rest is just going to stay. I decided to remove as much as I could just for peace of mind. I didn't want to hate myself everytime I walked across the lawn, so at least now I will feel a little better knowing that I gave it my all (I know I will still end up with lumps). Next steps that I am planning is to add some 3 way soil to help help finish off the grading for the wall, and to also add a couple inches everywhere else. So, my next question is, should I till the couple inches of 3 way in with the existing dirt, or just leave it sitting on the top? At this point, I am starting to think I should have just left the tiller at the store, but just trying to do the best I can at this point. I am planning on throwing seed down that consists of various varieties of rye and fescues. From what I have read, kentucky blue grass does not do well in the Seattle weather because it does not get cold enough in the winter.

I have started to read the organics section as well, thanks for the suggestion. Sounds fun, I might give some of that a try as well (after I finally get some grass going!).

Thanks!!

I'm not sure exactly where you're at in the process. I rented a walk behind harley power rake to do the finish grade on my yard. It will take out all the lumps and give a nice even finsh. Good luck!

I'm in the exact spot you are. I had a decent lawn but my better half didn't read instructions when using fertilizer and killed all the grass. That said, he just tilled the entire back lawn, large area, I have 3/4 of it raked , ( a nightmare & hard work just to remove the old grass & weeds. Even worse, I'm thinking g it's now too late in season to reseed. Wondering if I should amend the soil I've prepared and leave the rest until next spring or just leave it all until next spring. It's just a big lot of dirt at this point, in Denver.

It's amazing to read post from 13 yrs ago realizing even in 2021 Grass is grass, the process of restoring or repairing stays the same. No short cuts here. I'm just praying someone responds quickly as I. In a time crunch. Its mow the end of Sept. The weather is going to turn quickly. It can freeze in Sept but hasn't yet this year. I feel I don't have enough time to finish grading, amend soil and reseed before the snow comes. Doesn't the soil need time to root before tge ground freezes?

Hi leAnn. I'm still around, but I'm not sure Philes is. I see him on other forums, and we still normally disagree ;-)

Plant something now. Grass is good because that's what you want, but you could plant anything that grows to get roots in the ground. You've probably heard of 'organic matter' in the soil. Most of that organic matter is roots sloughed off from plants. Grass loses about 1/3 of its roots every year. Those roots become food for the microbial biology living in the soil and contribute to the health of the soil. If you throw grass seed you will get some germination before the soil becomes too cold. Any seed that does not germinate now could germinate during a warm spell that is sure to happen later in the year or prior to next April. You can even apply more seed in the January time frame. No it won't germinate right away, but it will be down and ready for the unexpected warmth that always happens.

Just because you have cold air temperatures, the soil temperature is always warmer. That's where the seeds are.

Also you don't need to amend the soil first. Do that later. In fact wait until spring. First get the $25 soil test from Logan Labs in Ohio, and let us know what the results were. I can get you ton's of free advice but only for Logan Labs tests. I know a guy who knows a guy ;-)