Thanks for the replies. That makes perfect sense j4c11, but I hadn't read that anywhere. So if you buy a bag of pre-mixed KBG and Fescue, is there any danger that all of the Fescue will have settled to the bottom? Should you somehow manually mix the seed again before spreading?

Morpheuspa, I can accelerate the schedule at least 2 weeks if that makes more sense. I was worried about getting too aggressive and seeding too early. I also wanted to give the new topsoil a chance to germinate weeds (2 weeks) and then kill them, but I guess if I'm using Tenacity that isn't too big of a deal. I also just realized that my planned second "killing" will be two weeks after the first killing. I can kill as soon as I bring in the new topsoil, then the second killing will catch anything that springs up in the new topsoil. I can easily get the scheduled seeding into August. Maybe around 21 August.

There's no such thing as seeding too early. I got forced into a super early renovation in July. It went fine, but took a while as a lot of seed didn't sprout until temperatures fell.

You can also kill the vegetation right now if you want (or soon, whatever works) to give you the fallow period while you're working on the other stuff. The earlier the better as far as killing it goes to give you as much time as possible.

No matter what you do, it's going to be a weed field. It always is, but Tenacity will help out there. Still, for a while you're going to wonder what the heck you just did. :-)

What's the purpose of the new topsoil? For one there's usually no good reason, and secondly you wasted your soil test on the old soil if you bring in new soil after the test soil goes in. If you're just bringing in new soil because it seems like the right idea, it isn't. More soil on top of the old soil is going to change your drainage and usually for the worse unless you're a professional topsoil mover.

dchall_san_antonio,

I've got 5 fence posts that I'm going to dig out of the ground, 6-7 stumps that I'm grinding out, 2 bushes that will be dug out - I don't have enough topsoil lying around to fill those holes. The largest portion of the topsoil is going to level out an area behind a retaining wall that was put in about 3-4 years ago. That dirt has settled and I'd like to bring it back up to the height of the retaining wall.

retaining wall's are meant to be higher then the ground so not to much weigh is put on them.

I'm realizing that I need to chose and purchase my seed ASAP, that supplies run out this time of year (I'm seeing this already). I thought I'd wait for my soil test results, but it seems that those will have little impact on my choice of seed.

So, after tons of reading, Googling, and NTEP report examination (http://www.ntep.org/data/kb05/kb05_11-9/kb05pa110t.txt) - I think I'd like to use Bewitched or a Bewitched KBG blend (Bewitched/Blueberry/Rhapsody?) for my sunny areas and a Bewitched/TTF(Rhambler?) for my shade areas. My shade areas get several hours of sun each day, my hope is that the Bewitched could do well there with its shade tolerance.

How important is it to use a KBG blend rather than a monostand (new word I learned this weekend)? I'm also a bit unsure on my shade mixture, can those two work together?

Rhambler is a very fine bladed dark color fescue. It should work well mixed with KBG.

I'm not a KBG expert but I believe mixing of cultivars is done to avoid a single disease wiping out your entire lawn. Some cultivars are more susceptible to some diseases than others. A monostand gives you uniformity. Maybe MorpheusPA will chime in and give you some direction on which is more important, he's the KBG guy.

I would not try to micro manage your choices. I think you'll be thrilled with what you have in mind.

Just got my soil test results from PSU. They're telling me I just need some phosphorus. They did note to not add more than 9 lbs of 0-46-0 to a non-tilled new grass plant.

You got real lucky as this is a near-perfect test off the bat, and the phosphorus doesn't have to be added all at once. P is very slow to perk down and you actually don't want to pile it on. It causes problems with phosphorus antagonism in other elements.

When you seed, apply any good starter fertilizer at the bag rate (the cheapest is great, they're really all the same thing).

One month after that, repeat.

Winterize when growth stops but the grass is still green (usually November 10th to December 15th, but it does vary) with a high nitrogen, low everything else fertilizer (this is the wrong moment to add phosphorus).

For 2017, here's your feeding schedule:

Memorial Day 2017: Apply starter fertilizer at the bag rate.

Labor Day: Apply starter fertilizer at the bag rate.

October 1: Apply starter fertilizer at the bag rate.

Winterize as you did in 2016 at the proper time.

Retest your soil sometime late in 2017 or early 2018.

+1 on the seed choices. While Bewitched and its relatives are great grasses, a disease they're susceptible to will sweep through in nothing flat as there's no firebreak. It's best to mix different types of grass, even if things aren't quite perfect otherwise.

Personally, I'd suggest Prosperity, Bewitched, and Moonlight SLT, but I'm hardly a cultivar expert at this point.

Thanks Morpheus. I live in farm country and I've been told that we're supposed to have good soil, but I wasn't holding my breath. I've moved the schedule up and plan to have seed on the ground no later than 21 Aug. Glypho should be delivered tonight, first nuke will happen tomorrow AM. I've started a thread on the site, my alias over there is LeftField11.

You do have good soil. Ca, Mg, and K saturations are all perfect. Personally, I wouldn't've minded kicking the K just a touch, but it's not necessary and I'm not going to suggest it with a reno coming up shortly. You have enough to do.

Mind you, Penn State doesn't test the minor elements, so there could be problems there. And, of course, phosphorus was kind of low.

I'm guessing you mean over on The Other Site. I don't go over there, but I can follow along here.

Good to know, I'll continue to update this site too. Thanks again for the help.

Kris you seem like a natural for this hobby. You're doing the research well, asking the right questions, and making well informed decisions. We're looking forward to seeing how it looks as the project goes on. Be sure to take some before pictures.

Thanks dchall_san_antonio, I've been drinking from a fire hose of information these last 2 weeks. When I decide to do something, I like to do it the right way (my wife calls it "obsessive").

I took some pictures this morning as I was nuking it, I'll try to get a couple posted. The pics made me realize how much clean up I still need to do, but I've got a couple weeks here while I'm fallowing. Just plugging away at it.

Day 1, I've nuked everything green.

Scalped the yard last night, 8/2. It looks like the first glypho application on 7/28 was pretty successful. I was a little worried when it didn't turn completely brown in 3 days, but it's looking pretty dead now (5 days).

My rotary mower was on the lowest setting and I was disappointed that it didn't scalp closer. This is my older, "crappy" mower (the better one is in the shop). You have to move the wheels to change the cut height, and there are only 3 positions for the wheels. I'm going to mod this mower with at least one more set of wheel holes so that I can get the cut another half inch or more lower. I'll try to get some pics today.

Kill #1 - 7/29
Scalped - 8/2
Kill #2 - 8/5

Getting nice and toasty

No turning back now.

Well, that's dead. :-) You may need to touch up those few little green areas, but it looks great.

It's hard to tell, but it seems that your mower ended up doing a perfectly fine job, and low enough. From looking at the edges, there doesn't seem to be much left.

I probably had three quarters of an inch or even a bit more of stubble remaining. It worked out fine, and even helped break up water flow during our (inevitable) thunderstorms.

Modified my older mower last night with an extra low wheel hole for a final scalp. It worked better than I had expected, got a very tight scalp on the front yard, will do the back sometime today.

Had to change my irrigation plan this weekend. I bought four oscillating Melnor sprinklers that were supposed to cover 3900 sq ft each, and planned to use two in front and two in back. Tested them out this weekend and they don't cover nearly enough area. My water pressure is good and I have 1/2" hoses, not sure why they don't perform better. One the other hand, I bought an $8 impact sprinkler to test and it covers way more than I expected. I'll be using 4 Rain Bird impact sprinklers in the back yard and 3 in the front yard. Rain Bird Plastic Impact Sprinkler P5-R+ There sprinklers are also a bit more "customizable" when it comes to a couple narrow spots that I need to reach. I realize that impact sprinklers probably don't cover as evenly as the oscillating sprinklers, but I think they're definitely a better solution for my situation.

I'm behind the curve on fallowing, struggling with the decision of whether to go ahead and seed on my planned date (20 Aug) or push back a week to allow for a longer fallow.

Day -1 - Seed down tomorrow. For some reason August 17th sounds a lot better to me than August 20th, so seed is going down tomorrow. I'll probably be out of bed at 5:30 AM and outside at first light. Really, I'm just going out of my mind waiting to get seed on the ground, I have to be done with it. I understand that I probably didn't fallow as long as what is optimal, but I'm hoping the Tenacity earns it's keep and helps me out there. Updated process timeline and pics. I decided to top-dress with peat moss (by hand) over the entire yard. Walmart has 2.2 cu ft bales for $3.50 right now, so it ended up being a no brainer.

Good luck! You have a nice blank canvas to start with

I forgot to update this thread last week.

Seed is on the ground. Seed and starter (I chose 18-24-5 due to my low phosphorus) went down on Wednesday, 8/17. I didn't have time to spray Tenacity or top dress it with peat moss that day. Got some rain that night and might have had a little wash out in the bare areas.

Threw a little seed down by hand on the washed out areas on Thursday, 8/18, sprayed Tenacity at 4 oz/acre and spread peat moss over the entire yard. If my math is right, it took about 43 cu ft of peat moss to cover 9600 sq ft of yard. I went heavier on the bare areas than the areas with dead turf. Spreading the peat with a shovel really wasn't that bad, took about 3.5 hours.

Saturday, 8/20, I changed my irrigation plan again. I wasn't happy with the impact sprinklers so I bought 7 Orbit rotators and mounted them on spikes. I'm much happier with the coverage they provide. I really need to get the irrigation nailed down before germination. If germination is delayed a couple days it's not a big deal, but once I have seedlings I need to be able to keep them moist.

Pic from yesterday, Day 4, Aug 21. Possible sprouts.

Pretty sure the previous pic is not KBG sprouts. Also, pretty sure that these are, day 6.

Just one reason seed sucks. It seems so easy at first, but why won't it just grow?!?!

Day 8 - So I knew this process was going to take a while, and would require patience (of which I don't have an abundance), but I didn't realize that I'd be 2nd, 3rd, 4th guessing everything that I did. The longer this goes, the more I question what I'm doing.

Anyhow, I have sprouts in almost all shady areas, areas that I would have actually thought might be getting too wet, too much water. I have no sprouts in areas that receive significant amounts of sun during the day. From reading other threads I believe this to be pretty normal, but I'm fighting the urge to start watering more. Some of the sunny areas never seem to get really wet even though I'm watering 6 times per day for 15 min each.

I keep going back to the things that I "know" (have read): KBG typically germinates in 14-21 days, my shade areas are ahead of the curve; it's normal for shady areas to germinate first; some people water 3 times per day for 20 minutes and it's plenty.

So I guess I answered my own question - I'm watering plenty. Give it some time.

The longer this goes, the more I question what I'm doing.

Yea, then one day you wake up, look out the window and smile because your yard looks good and you did it.

Day 12

I'm glad I've been taking pictures. I didn't think much was happening, then I compared today's pics to the pics from 4 days ago and I can definitely see a change. I guess it's hard to notice the change when you're going out and looking at it every 10 minutes.

The shady and bare areas have sprouted and are growing. Full-sun, south facing slopes have not sprouted. Not real worried at this point, we're still hitting 90 degrees everyday, I think it's slowing the germination especially in the "hot" areas. Trying to stay patient.

That's going to look awesome once that KBG gets established and starts spreading.

Day 16 pics - showing a little more green.

Looking good so far. Shady areas still doing well I see.

. . . and sunny areas still struggling. Actually, in the last two days the sunny ares are starting to show some life. In the sunniest areas I increased the watering to once an hour for a couple days to see if that helps any. It seems to be helping.

Day 21. I'm not convinced that germination is done, I'm still seeing new sprouts daily. The heat and drought has made irrigation challenging. I believe that my major problem area - a southwest facing slope in the front yard - has not be receiving sufficient water. I had a rotator sprinkler at the top of the hill, and I don't think the downslope was holding any water. I've put four impact sprinklers in that area now, two at the bottom of the hill, two at the top. I'm going to water the hell out of it for the next week. If I still don't see germination after that, I'll reseed and re-peat that area. By that time the 90 degree days should be over as well.

But other than that area, I'm pretty pleased with how things are progressing, especially considering the heat.

I see you're on hoses and sprinklers like I am. I would highly recommend an Orbit 4 zone controller ( you will need to purchase 2 extra valves, it only comes with two). It has made my life so much easier this year, I have it set to go on 3 times a day, 30 minutes each zone. It turns the zones on one at a time. Last year I would spend the whole day moving hoses around and watering.

I haven't updated this in a while, but I'm still plugging away. It's far from a rousing success, and I'll probably need to do some serious work on it in the spring, but I'm oddly satisfied with where it's at, and with all that I've learned along the way. I'm still optimistic with a sold 30-45 days left in the growing season.

This week I decided that I had two different problems. First, the fine-fescue/Bewitched mix was not right for the shady area of the front yard. Half of that "shady" area gets full sun for 6+ hours a day, the fine-fescue couldn't hand that well. So I reseeded that area at 2 lbs/1000 sf on 21 Sep. I know that is late for KBG in southern PA, but I had the seed on hand and figured I'd give it a shot. The second probablem is (might be) grubs. My wife and I were pulling some weeds and she said, "What are these little dirt mounds?" I initially guessed earthworms, but now I'm worried they might be from grubs. I spread 24-hour grub killer tonight figuring what can it hurt? I'll see if we have dead grubs in the morning.

Going to start urea apps and maybe milk and alfalfa next week. Anything to get this ish to spread and fill in.

Fine fescue thriving in the shade

This hill is actually starting to fill in and my reseeding on 12 Sep is sprouting

This area is starting to fill in / sprout as well

This partial shade area behind the retaining wall has always, oddly been the best area

Day 43 - Wednesday was 6 weeks since seed down, things are still progressing and filling in. Some of the weeds are starting to whiten from Sunday's Tenacity app. I'm starting to think about a 2,4-D treatment in a couple weeks. Urea starts next week at 1/2 lb N per 1000 sq ft, I think I'm as excited for that as I was for seed down. These pics are the only thing that keep me sane, showing progress every 4-6 days.

Day 48 - I cut it again last night and it looked so good in certain spots this morning I had to take some pics. Just picked up 50 lbs of urea ($13) at the farm fertilizer company (pretty sure they don't typically get homeowners buying urea in September) and applied .5 N / 1000 ft sq this afternoon. So these pics also serve as pre-urea pics.

The Tenacity app from 9 days ago is doing work, crushing grassy weeds. Some bleaching on the KBG too, but that's to be expected.

I'm not sure what's going to happen with the tree side of the front yard, that might be a complete re-do next year, but we'll cross that bridge when we come to it.

I'm getting close to the prescribe prodiamine application at the 60 day mark. Will applying this now help prevent weeds in the spring? Just trying to understand the purpose of the prodiamine now. I'm considering a 2,4-D app in a couple weeks to get a couple more of the broadleaf weeds.

Looking good!

Prodiamine now will prevent winter annuals, like the dreaded Poa Annua. Since Poa Annua and Poa Pratensis(KBG) are in the same family there's no good selective control for Poa Annua in KBG. Some people say Tencity does the job, some say it doesn't.

You will need to apply again in the spring for spring/summer weeds.

Thanks j4c11. Would you suggest half apps (of the yearly total) of Prodiamine in fall and spring, or a full app of Prodiamine in fall, and a full app of a different pre-m in the spring? The Prodiamine label says the max yearly app for KBG is 0.55 oz per 1000 sq ft annually.

This is what he thinks.

Just over 60 days now. These pics are from a couple days ago. Mowing about every 4 days. I'm applying urea at .5 lb N / 1000 sq ft weekly. I also put alfalfa on it last night. I had it in my head that 10 lbs / 1000 sq ft was the prescribed dosage, but then read an alfalfa post by dchall saying that 20, 30, even 40 lbs per 1000 sq ft is good. So I'll grab a couple more bags this week and throw them down.

I'm pretty happy with it at this point. There will be work to be done in the spring, but it's 100% better than what I had when I started.

It's looking great. The high N and frequent cut regime should encourage it to start spreading and filling in those bare spots. But it might not be until next spring.

I realized I've neglected this thread, so here are some updated pics. Things are going well, I think. Currently have some rust in the front shade area that's a mix of FF and Bewitched. I have some areas in the backyard under the trees that are almost full shade and the KBG, even the Bewitched, is struggling mightily. Thinking of overseeding these areas with FF this fall. I really like how the FF is doing in the front yard.

Holy cow that looks fantastic.

So what KBG cultivars did you end up using? Is it all Bewitched or a mix?

It's an even mix of Bewitched, Blueberry, and Prosperity in the back yard and sunny side of the front yard (beside the truck.) The front yard, with the tree, is Bewitched, chewings (Intrigue) and creeping red (Navigator II) fine fescue.

I think I'm having a fungus issue in the backyard right now. I was trying the biofungicide method with cracked corn and Serenade, but I may need to ditch that plan for now and bring in a real fungicide.

That is outstanding, love the color. Maybe I need to do another renovation :-)