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ericjgay

Is my new sod rotting?

6 years ago

Hey all! I had Bermuda sod installed 3 weeks ago. I watered every day, twice a day (5AM and 5PM) for 15 minutes each up until the last couple of days. I recently changed to once a day for 20 minutes. I can't pull up any of the pieces of sod, which tells me the roots are established, and overall the lawn has turned more green since being installed and has filled in. I'm starting to notice some yellowing on some spots and around some edges. I've read about overwatering, but I don't think that's the case, but we have had a good bit of rainfall the past few days.


Any reason to believe my lawn is in trouble and what to do to remedy it?



Comments (5)

  • 6 years ago

    Yes, it is in trouble. You're loving it to death. Stop watering every day. Here's a motivational image for you. This is Kentucky bluegrass in the pic, but the effect with bermuda is identical.


    This is morpheuspa's lawn from July, 2011. Morph watered once a week(ish), and the rest of the lawns in the neighborhood were watered daily. Deep watering leads to deep roots which bring up nutrients from deeper in the soil. Shallow watering depletes the nutrients stores at the surface leading to poor looking grass.


    Let the grass go without watering for 3-4 days, and do a can test to time how long it takes to water. You are shooting for 1 inch. Put some cat food or tuna cans around your yard and turn on the sprinklers. Time how long it takes to fill all the cans. That is your new watering time from now on. My time with my sprinklers and water pressure is 8 hours. A neighbor has a high flow system, so his time is 20 minutes. Your time will be between those, I suspect.

    As to frequency, it should be obvious that if you are now watering for an hour or so, you won't need to do it every day. Bermuda is one of the toughest grasses, so you should have no problem watering once every week or two this time of year. If the bermuda starts to look wilted before a week is up, let it go another day or two and deep water again.

    Now that your roots are established, it is time to start fertilizing. Use any fast release, high N fertilizer you want every 6-8 weeks. If you want to use organics, something like soybean meal or corn gluten meal would be best. Use alfalfa pellets if you can't find either of the other two. The application rate for these is 15-20 pounds per 1,000 square feet.

    ericjgay thanked dchall8 .
  • 6 years ago

    Awesome information here. Thank you!

  • 6 years ago

    Ok @dchall8 . I just went outside and stuck my index finger into the grass/soil as far as I could, and it felt pretty moist about 2.5" down. The top of the soil is completely dry. Do I need to wait another day or two before my 1 inch water test? I don't want to do any more damage but I'm paranoid about killing my lawn. I kill anything green I touch, haha.

  • 6 years ago

    If it feels cool, then it has moisture. If the grass looks fine, then go another day or two.

    ericjgay thanked dchall8 .
  • 6 years ago

    Just following up. Let the grass dry out a few days. Then did a deep soak. Then put down some Lesco 24-0-11 fertilizer down, watered it, went on vacation and came back to a different ball game. Much more even, brown patches have filled in. Lush lawn! (You can see the line where the sod begins, but it’s filling in more and more every day.) It’s not perfect but it’s the best my lawn has ever looked.


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