This will be the last update for the BTEP until spring 2012. I might get one more mowing in and will apply urea winterizer at the appropriate time in November.

This fall my lawn had issues with rust and possibly some other fungus (might be leaf spot). The BTEP plot was not immune, but it is also not uncommon for new KBG to have rust issues in its infancy. Some cultivars did better than others, but none were affected to the point of noticing any diseased blades or discoloration from afar. Here is a closeup of the worst affected area in the Midnight Star plot:

The following are my subjective and unscientific observations regarding Leaf Width, Color, Effect of Tenacity (2 sprays 7 days apart in October at 5oz/acre), and the presence of Fungus (rust and perhaps leaf spot). Keep in mind that the grass is only about 10 weeks old, so these results should be taken with a grain of salt (or potassium ).

LW: Leaf Width – Fine, Medium-Fine, Medium, Medium-Coarse, Coarse
C: Color – Light Green, Medium Green, Dark Green, Dark Blue Green
T: Tenacity Effect (Bleaching) – None, Light, Medium, Heavy
F: Fungus (Rust/Leaf Spot) – None, Light, Medium, Heavy

The grasses are all grown up and have had a couple of haircuts! However, as you will see from the pictures, the weeds have moved in and I’m having a heck of a time trying to control them.

The weeds I am getting span from broadleafs, to clover-like, to chickweed-like, to grassy. I first used Quinclorac w/ MSO. No effect. Then I used plain Weed-B-Gon. No effect. Last weekend I brought out the heavy artillery and sprayed Tenacity with a NIS at the spot spray rate. I’m hoping for some white weeds in the near future, and will be interested to see how the individual cultivars react to the Tenacity. I will report on that once I start to see results.

60 day pictures
NOTE: you will notice a lot of light colored blades and weeds interspersed among the plots. These are weeds, not the actual cultivars or Tenacity effect.

Full Plot

Compact America. Clockwise from Top Left: America, Bedazzled, Prosperity, Boutique.
Prosperity is still the darkest of the group. I also like the thinner blades. America is nice and lush, but lighter than I expected. Boutique is also very nice.

Compact Midnight: Clockwise from Top Left: Blue Velvet, Midnight, Midnight II, Midnight Star.
Blue Velvet and Midnight Star are the darkest of this group. Surprisingly, at this point Midnight is darker than Midnight II.

Aggressive: Left to Right: Julius, Emblem.
Julius has darkened a bit and Emblem has filled out, but is full of weeds.

Big Box Blend: Top half: Schultz (mostly Barrister, a Compact Midnight), Bottom Half: Scott’s (mostly Abbey, a BVMG type).

Compact: Diva.

Compacts: Clockwise from Top Left: Bewitched, Blueberry, Moonbeam, Moonlight SLT.
We really like the gunmetal blue color of Moonbeam, but are not fans of the thick lades and prostrate growth habit, Moonlight SLT is very nice and Bewitched is nice as well.

I was out doing some yard work today, and it was overcast, so I felt the conditions were good for a photo update. The colors showed up well on camera. Once again, I took pictures according to type.

Compact America. Clockwise from Top Left: America, Bedazzled, Prosperity, Boutique.
Prosperity is my (and my wife’s) early favorite. Darkest and the most mature out of all the cultivars after 36 days.

Compact Midnight: Clockwise from Top Left: Blue Velvet, Midnight, Midnight II, Midnight Star.
All four are doing great. Blue Velvet is my top pick in this group.

Aggressive: Left to Right: Julius, Emblem.
One of the lightest and one of the darkest. I’d be surprised if either of them made my reno short list.

Big Box Blend: Top half: Schultz (mostly Barrister, a Compact Midnight), Bottom Half: Scott’s (mostly Abbey, a BVMG type). Darned if I can tell the difference. One of the lightest.

Compact: Diva. Couldn’t fit all 5 Compacts in the same frame, so Diva fits its name and gets its own picture. I really want to like Diva because of its purported water-miser tendencies, but man is it bright green, almost neon

Compacts: Clockwise from Top Left: Bewitched, Blueberry, Moonbeam, Moonlight SLT.
They’re all fairly dark, and fairly slow to establish.

Here is an 30 day overview picture, and my subjective opinions on color:

Dark Green: Prosperity, Midnight Star (lightest), Blue Velvet (lightest), Moonbeam, Bewitched, Blueberry, Emblem (darkest)

Medium Green: Boutique, Midnight II, Midnight, Moonlight SLT

Light Green: America (darkest), Bedazzled, Diva, Julius, Schultz/Scotts

I took some photos to show how the cultivars “look” and so you can get a better idea on germination progress. I can’t think of a good way to measure the time at which 100% germination has taken place since some of the “laggards” may have been caused by bad seed, washout, erratic seed distribution on my part, etc. I’ll just let the photos speak for themselves.

Whole Plot

Compact Americas – Clockwise from top left: America, Bedazzled, Prosperity, Boutique. All are doing quite well and are at or near full germination. A corner of the Bedazzled got washed out and germinated “outside the box”.

Compact Midnights – Clockwise from top left: Blue Velvet, Midnight, Midnight II, Midnight Star.

Aggressive – left to right: Julius, Emblem. I’m just waiting for day 50 to see if Emblem really takes off like Andy says it does. Regardless, Emblem would not be a good cultivar to use to overseed. It would not get established quickly enough to oversome the existing grass and the mowing.

Big Box Store Mix – Hey it looks great right now. Can’t complain. We’ll see next year.

Compact – top row, left to right : Bewitched, Blueberry. Bottom row, left to right: Monlight SLT, Moonbeam, Diva. I really don’t know what’s going on with Blueberry. It took off like a rocket, but ever since day 7 or 8, it has looked pretty much the same. Bewitched and Moonbeam have been slow from the beginning. I have been impressed with Diva. If it ends up being dark enough, I will seriously consider it, assuming the claims that it is a water miser are true.

All cultivars have germinated, some faster than others. Also, some are racing out of the gates as far as growth and coverage, while others seem to be stuck at the starting gate. There are simply too many variables to come to definite conclusions so early in the game. I will be more interested in how things look come October, and especially next May.

Here are the official germination days and an update pic from this morning. Those that seem to be lagging right now are: Boutique, Moonbeam, Bewitched and Emblem.

It hasn’t been quite 6 days since I seeded, and already I have germination in 9 of the 17 cultivars:

Compact: Blueberry, Diva, Moonlight SLT
Compact America: America, Bedazzled, Prosperity
Compact Midnight: Midnight II, Midnight Star
Aggressive: Julius

A couple of other plots had a few stray seedlings, but not enough for me to definitively call it “germination”. I expect them to join the germination club tomorrow.

Here is a pic of Bedazzled, probably the strongest germinator so far:

I seeded my test plot on 8/18/2011. I tried to seed each plot the same way, but there were unavoidable small differences in seed amounts, distribution, top dressing, etc. Based on pure math, I probably should have only seeded 0.1 oz for each plot, but I ended up seeding much more than that. I’m hoping with the extra space I left around each cultivar, that they will happily spread and have room for all the little seeds to germinate and thrive. Here’s a summary of what I did:

1. Found a box 18″ x 18″ to use as my seeding guide. Seeded in the center of each 4′ x 4′ section. That should give 18″ on all four sides to spread over the next couple of years.

2. Based on the seed available to me, I spread about 1/5 cup of seeds over the 18″ x 18″ area. I tried to spread it as evenly as possible but was not always successful. Also, certain cultivars had a bit less than 1/5 cup of seeds. Heck, they may end up doing better. We shall see.

3. Top dressed with a mish mash of stuff I had left over from the spring: some peat moss, some seed starter, and some potting soil.

4. Rolled.

5. Spread some Milorganite. I decided against using starter fertilizer because my Phosphorus levels were already very high, and I had spread some 10-10-10 a couple of weeks ago, and spread some Potash a couple of days ago. I will continue with Milorganite feedings once a week or every two weeks, and finish off with Urea in November.

6. Water!

I will keep the soil most but not wet, and keep track of germination times. I will also hand pick weeds as needed. In retrospect I wish I had more time to fallow. Those pesky weeds keep coming up!

Here is a picture of the plot after seeding, and a seeding chart so that you know what cultivars were seeded where. The different colors represent the different KBG types:
Red: Compact
Yellow: Big Box Store
Orange: Aggressive
Green: Compact America
Blue: Compact Midnight

As you will see from the pictures below, I managed to get some crabgrass and some other weed seeds to germinate during my fallowing period. Today I nuked the weeds again with Round Up. I will seed in two or three days.

My Logan soil test also came back and I was generally pleased with the results. My pH came in at 7.0, an improvement from 7.3 from a year ago. Although this can simply be statistical or sample variance and not a definite reduction. None of my micros were deficient. My Magnesium was high as expected, but my Potassium came in on the lower range of “normal”. I had some Muriate of Potash lying around, so I spread some on the test plot area (I hope Morpheus doesn’t yell at me for doing that ).

Zzzzzzzzz. Fallowing is kinda boring work, but absolutely necessary to hopefully avoid more problems down the road. I think one of the problems is that as humans, we look for instant gratification, or at least a light at the end of the tunnel. There is nothing like the anticipation of seeing the first green fuzz of your carefully selected KBG cultivar(s). In the case of fallowing, the best you can hope for is some weed seeds to sprout, only to be killed again. Come to think of it, there is some satisfaction in that. Rooting out the enemy…I like that!

Fallowing is especially important in this case, because after I killed and scalped the test plot area, I noticed to uneven sections. I poked around, and found some softball-sized rocks near the surface, as well as some roots from a removed tree, and finally, some construction refuse (nails, glass) that had probably been buried for over 15 years. I disturbed a fair amount of soil getting the rocks, roots and garbage out, and leveling the surface with bagged topsoil. That’s why I am fallowing for at least two weeks before seeding.

In the meantime, I have taken some soil samples and will send them off to Logan today. I have also decided where to seed each cultivar, and will share both the test results and seed locations in future posts.