N is not tested in the soil test. Why? Because the N they test for is extremely transient in the soil. You're going to fertilize bermuda as often as once a month to keep up with it, so you can take the soil test any time now.

Ok, just got off the phone with Logan Labs they will be sending my test kit soon so I can get down to the nitty gritty on this. It'll be after the holiday before I get an answer since they take off. The requested two cups worth of soul from multiple locations. How far down should I fish foil the soil they will be analyzing?

RJ: I'll alternate and see how it goes. I don't allow anyone on the yard at all, I tippy toe across it when I have to lol!! I think the weather will play in my favor with the exception of rain. The Alabama heat is brutal and the humidity can be cut with a knife so o know the grass likes it.

GET OFF MY LAWN! So you're that guy!

4 inches deep. If you do any deeper, let us know when you post the soil test results.

Haha!!!! Absolutely that guy, for now anyways Once I get a good foundation I'll slack off, one of the main reasons I planted such a resilient grass though so I don't have to baby it so much. I can't submit my soil until after the fourth. It'll just sit there for now, so it kinda sucks waiting but ohh well. Tomorrow will be two weeks from plant date I'll post pics

Looks good! Any luck finding a sod farm or outlet local where you can grab a few squares of 419 to fill the stubborn spots?

I have found a place, how terrible will it look as far as color and leaf density differences though? Honestly lol

It'll look better than bare dirt, that's for sure. You won't notice much difference. This pic is 419, celebration & seeded Bermuda triangle all in one picture. Very few people will ever stare long or close enough to tell the difference once grown in.

It will look bad. Yukon looks better than the sod imho. I finally got some Celebration sod last weekend & it looks really different. As you can see for yourself that these bermudas do like look similar. The texture is off and so is the color. Yukon was my first experience seeing bermudagrass other than what grew natively in my TTTF. I was going to patch areas in my back yard with the Celebration sod, but I think it will look very noticeable & will die. In my front yard I had my tree pruned back really well yesterday to let in more light so I can put the Yukon there instead on the Celebration. I'm going to experiment with some Celebration plugs but not go full tilt like I had wanted.

Celebration in full sun Saturday - Wednesday, moved to shade attempting to salvage it.

Celebration in shade Saturday - Wednesday

Side by side after move

Celebration close up (shaded group)

Yukon

Yukon

I won't disagree, but it may not be a fair comparison. Yukon is only tender young shoots & the celebration has fully formed stolons. That said, I'm interested in hawksster continuing this particular comparison as both progress. Please do if you have the time hawk.

Ehhhh I guess it depends on the type you go with as far as comparing side by side. If I didn't give a rip I'd throw something down and say to heck with it. In the pictures there is a pretty prominent difference, but on the other hand, it is better than bare dirt. I guess I'll cross the bridge when it gets here. I am having constant germination still at this point and it could all fill in eventually just perhaps not fast enough for my liking lol. Also, I have called every single co-op/lowes/Home Depot/ace/tractor supply/etc....within a 100mile radius and nowhere has slow release nitrogen.... Can't find a number for lesco... All I can get is 34-0-0 fast release that's

10% ammoniacal nitrogen

24% urea nitrogen

I'm worried I'm ruin my grass with it. Can I use anything else and feed this young upcoming beast of a lawn or can I in fact use what I have with no worries

You can order online from HD for free delivery to the store. I use Vigoro Super Green it costs about $3.059/k. You can use the fast release on bermuda it's very hard to damage. Your bare spots will fill in quickly, especially if you are feeding it well. I'm currently on my 3rd mow. Since I'm not letting the grass grow up, it's growing out. I have stolons ~2ft long. Everyday areas fill in upwards of 3" in some spots. It's 102 degrees & I am only watering every 3 days but the grass is soft & moist when I touch it. The soil consumes everything. Corn, SBM, milorganite, and clipping all are gone within 24 hrs. Other areas of my property takes > 2 wks to go away.

I am going to feed heavily every 2 wks, I need to up my OM. You can use the fast release fert, just do it every wk in 1/2 dose for heavy feeding or 1/2 every 2 wks for the a regular rate. On day 15, I was feeling just like you are now. By day 18 I walking on the stuff, day 23 - 1st mow, day 27 - 2nd mow, day 30 - 3rd mow (without watering since previous mow). If you have the heat, watering, & are feeding I presume you will get very similar results.

Yo that super green is in stock, so huge thanks on pointing it out to me! It says it feeds for 5 months.... Sooooo the average slow release is what, one feeding a month, fast release every two weeks. If I buy this stuff what's my plan of action in regards to application timeline/s

The average for normal people with normal lawns & normal expectations is 4 times a year if that. For a better looking lawn you can feed your bermuda once every 4-6 weeks during the growing season. You want to apply 0.5 - 1.0 lb/k per application, that's 2.8 lbs/k of the Vigoro SG (35-0-5 = 100/35 = 2.8 lbs/k). If you are going organic, you can do the standard 15-20 lbs of product/k each application.

If you would like to elevate to insane levels of feeding start here (Note: this is a bluegrass lawn). My plan is at least 1 bag of Milorganite, Vigoro @ bag rate, corn/alfalfa 20 lbs, SBM 10 - 15 lbs every 2 wks.I will also mulch clippings and mulch in as many leaves as I can get this Fall. Hopefully this will get my OM up a bit before my April 2017 soil sample.

WOW! That's a crazy feeding schedule on the KBG I'll stick with the first one lol. I'm gonna swing by the Home Depot to pick up some vigoro sg this weekend and apply it in two more weeks. Probably do the .5lb rate since I just dropped starter fert almost a week ago. Might even do a 1/4-lb/K rate of fast release with the slow release to kickstart it. Sound ok?

Yep, sounds good.

Bermuda can take all the fast release high N you can throw at it. If you're shooting for lawn of the month, apply ammonium sulfate every 4 weeks all through the growing season. In addition apply one app of an organic fertilizer like soybean meal, milorganite, alfalfa pellets (rabbit chow), corn meal, or corn gluten meal at 15 pounds per 1,000 square feet. An annual organic app will keep the soil relatively healthy and make the other fertilizer work better. You might not notice unless you saw two lawns side by side where one had the additional organic. You would definitely notice if you applied organic to a lawn that had gone several years with nothing but chemical fertilizers.

So I'm good to use this at 1Lb/k every 4 weeks with no worries of harm?

I'm not familiar with bermuda but I would say 1lb of product a month sounds low, that's only 0.34 lbs of nitrogen. Definitely should be safe.

1 pound of N per 1k sq/ft? Every 4weeks

That nitrogen level will have you mowing twice a week & encourage far too much brown stem action for my taste. The grass can take it, but I would recommend half that unless you really really like to mow a lot & wish to drown yourself in thatch & clippings. I've been there, I listened to this the first few years. All I got was thatch, sweat & worn out mowers. Go organic as much as possible for fertilizer, don't follow the old golf course Bermuda rules. I've shown you what works in the real world.

Nah I'll do what you all recommend. That's why I came here in the first place. Without all the tips and advice I've gotten so far I'd still be lost and clueless. Instead I'm knowledgable now and I'm getting great results! I'm just being overly cautious since it's my first rodeo

To be clear, I don't wish to criticize people who mow at 3/8 of an inch 3 times a week & dump 3 pounds on N on their Bermuda every summer--Their lawns look fantastic too. I just cannot & will not recommend that to a new Bermuda owner. It's an improper introduction to this grass & leaves many new owners with a bad taste in their mouth. Once a Bermuda lawn is 5 or 10 years old & the owner is looking for that last 5% of perfection, then I recommend the conventional wisdom, along with a gas powered reel & a healthy water/fertilizer budget. It just causes more problems than it solves for new owners, in my personal opinion.

Lotta truth there reeljake. When I write about what bermuda wants, I almost never take into account the experience level of the reader.

It's all good criticism/advice to me, I appreciate any and all feedback. And I being a rookie on Bermuda, prefer not going to take on so many responsibilities that I can't sit back, drink a few brews and enjoy my new lawn.

Few things on earth are as satisfying as an ice cold St. Arnold on the porch while the Bermuda still has that fresh cut smell!

I'll be giving mine its first cut the day after the 4th. 1/3 rule apply to first cut still

A razor sharp blade is most important on the first cut, but yes the rule still applies. Green is good. You'll have plenty of annual scalping in your future, but luckily no dead grass, no fungal issues & no huge water bills. Ever.

Today was the first cut, 18 days after seeding! I attached some pics. Where it's actually coming in its booming! Still hardly any germination in the other areas.... I'm beginning to question if I done something wrong now bc the differences are so dramatic

If it spreads the way it's spreading in my fescue and over my mulch beds it should be filled in shortly.

Haha it's always that way when you don't want it to be, or so it seems.

Looks great!

RJ did you have as much coverage that was as bare as mine? I'm thinking about renting a slit seeder and doing those spots.

On another note, I'm almost spot on with what you said as far as growth/cut/feedings timeline lol good call cuz

I never had enough germination when I tried seeding the lawn a few years ago & I switched to sod, so I can't say. My germination was probably less than 30%. I seeded my little golf pad & got about 80%, it just took forever to start growing horizontally & fill in, which is why I'm a sod man these days!

Is it just these hybrid Bermudas that are slow? The wild Bermuda I'm getting popped up maybe 4 weeks ago and I'm fairly certain they're from seed, they're standalone plants. I pulled some out a week ago and they were already sending runners . The ones that aren't inconvenienced by the fescue grew about 2 feet in a couple of weeks over the mulch bed and had already dropped 6 inch roots into the mulch at each node. This stuff is nasty. If y'all are having trouble getting your bermuda to fill in I'll be happy to send you some cuttings, it will take care of your problem in no time.

Yeah right, I pull enough junky wild Bermuda out of my beds as it is, so you can keep that stuff! And yes, the lawn type Bermuda, whether hybrid or improved common, fills in much slower & looks much nicer. It's a constant battle to keep it edged regardless.

3 weeks in. Been mowed twice already. Yesteday.... Probably not the smartest thing to do but I went ahead and drug the de-thatcher through the bare areas(ground seemed really compacted) raked any debris out, spread some black kow manure, seed/sand and very lightly raked over it. Been watering like crazy again. Trying to catch up still with the other parts of the lawn. Looks awesome where it's growing good yea!? Also have some ugly centipede trying to come back.... Comments from the wise...

Texasgohorns,

I am in 28630 zip code area, and looking for fine blade bermuda seeds. Could you or anyone here tell me what type and where to buy it?

Thank You!

@ houses14 unless you are in an area where you do not have access to bermuda sod, you should not seed bermuda. A recurring theme is that people may believe seeded bermuda is less expensive, this is not true. There are costs associated with starting a bermuda lawn from seed that will eventually cost you more money. Bermuda is a truly difficult grass to grow from seed. It takes a lot of time & effort. Sod, if available, is a far better option.

Princess 77 and Yukon are likely to be your best choice as far as comparing to Tif-419. And again, online will likely be your best bet at buying

Hawk said it best!!!

One month from the date I seeded....

Looking good. You still have time this season to get some really good coverage.

Hawk.... Im not having annnnny lateral growth. It's all straight up and down. It is normal due to the age of the grass or what?

It may just look like it's no lateral growth. Your runners are green just like your grass, very hard to see - especially since your are mowing higher. They reach out a little bit, drop roots in the soil, then repeat. In my picture above from 6/30 you can see the stolons if you look close enough. They look completely different from the stolon of the native bermuda I have. There is no browning in our newer grass, so look really hard & you should see them.

Did you change mowers? Are you using a rotary mower? Your cut grass look butchered compared to last week's clean cuts.

I knew one of you guys would notice it... Lol I kept everything the same and all I can think of is where I've been cutting it so frequently and over the bare spots that are a lot of dirt/rocks perhaps it dulled the blade. As I was taking the pictures to post on here I noticed it then and was like wtf!!!!! It looks terrible I agree and already the tops are browned and my yard almost immediately looks like ish... I'll be ok still won't I?

Yeah it's still a little early for true lateral growth, but they are tillering some roots out under the surface as well. Just keep cutting short & the grass will get trained. Bare spots can sometimes sandblast your sharp blade, but a fresh one shouldn't be too costly, or just put a new edge on it with a Dremel. Overall it's looking good!

No sweat, we've all had a dull blade before!