# rmengel's Front yard Provista (gly tolerant) KBG reno



## rmengel (Jul 12, 2021)

Hey all,

This is technically only half my yard, as the yard is divided by a walkway and the smaller half got ProVista KBG sod.

Anyway, we're looking at about 900 square feet of ProVista KBG. There aren't many documented instances of people planting this stuff, so I figured I would give it a go.

*About me*: I have a few years of lawncare experience but other than a 100sqft test plot, I've never done a reno before. This is also my first KBG monostand/experience with an elite cultivar. I have an irrigation system

Anyway, here's what I'm working with right now (8/30):
- *8/26 (Last Thurs)* smacked the old grass with 1.5x label rate of gly (and non-ionic surfactant)
- *3/30 (Today, Monday)* hit the lawn with 0.5x label rate of gly. I know you're supposed to wait longer and blah blah blah but I'm up against the clock here and need this old stuff dead quick. It's currently looking like the worst lawn on the block, so the gly is working, but it's nowhere near ready for the dethatcher yet.

Future plans (subject to shift based on whether or not the old grass looks dead by Friday):
- *Friday 9/3*: Rent dethatcher, rip everything up
- *Saturday 9/10*: Pick up about 1 yard of screened topsoil from a local composter (not compost) and level things out using my new Landzie/Ryan Knorr rake. Spot application of gly as needed, and hit the whole thing with tenacity
- *Sunday 9/11*: The big day - *Seed Down!* - and top dress with a little bit of peat. Not a ton, but something. Label rate app of fertilizer (without Pre-M since I already did tenacity)
- *9/20ish*: Second app of starter fert, probably pick something that encourages root growth to get this stuff to spread.

Irrigation will be on the hour every hour for one minute from 8am to 4 or 5pm until I see some sort of growth. At that point, I'll probably dial it back to 6am, 12pm, 3pm or something like that. I face west and have the house blocking the sun for the better part of the morning.

I know this is ambitious, but hell my old lawn looked so terrible that if I screw it up I'll just throw down scotts coated big box PRG crap and still be in better shape than I was before.


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## lbb091919 (Apr 26, 2020)

Cool that you're going with ProVista.

Plan looks pretty solid since you're on a time crunch but I do have some suggestions.

1) Scalp it as low as you can go before running the dethatcher and bag it. This will stunt the existing grass that's already dying, reduce the mess that the dethatcher makes, and open things up more for your seed to get to the soil.

2) Spray your tenacity after the seed goes down and before the peat moss.

3) Wait on the second app of starter until about 2 weeks after first germination. 10 days after seeding is a little soon.

Good luck!


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## g-man (Jun 15, 2017)

@timmybluegrass did a provista seed. I think he shared it was super slow and he is in Maryland. I think starting this in mid September in Michigan can be too late.


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## timmybluegrass (Oct 19, 2020)

I would absolutely agree with @g-man. I seeded my lawn in two parts, one on roughly August 26th and the other on roughly September 5th. I'm in Maryland and if I had to do it again I would would have seeded a week to ten days earlier. Obviously I am just one person but everyone I have ever spoken to has found ProVista to be a very slow germinator and have a painfully long sprout n' pout.

Best of luck to you and if I can be of any assistance, please just give me a shout.


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## mobiledynamics (Aug 9, 2020)

I'll have to call the local sod farm that I know carries PV

How are you guys getting ProVista seed ? I thought it was -exclusive - on the sod farm level ?


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## rmengel (Jul 12, 2021)

@mobiledynamics - There is a list of distributors on provistaturf.com That said, I don't think Scott's is playing 100% fair with who gets it first, which is gonna make for some hell-ish renos with guys starting even later than me.

@g-man and @timmybluegrass - do you think I'm already too late? I know one of you mentioned that mid-september is a bad idea, but do you think I am crazy for seed down this weekend? The weather here in Michigan has been unseasonably hot until basically today (90+ on a regular basis for the past 3ish weeks), so I'm hoping we get some good growing conditions.

Also, here's a pic of what my lawn looks like now. The ultra-dead spots were sprayed early August since they were pure quackgrass that didn't want to die. The rest of it was first sprayed on Thursday and I just scalped it today.


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## rmengel (Jul 12, 2021)

Side note: I used roundup concentrate here. Does this look like I didn't use enough or am I just being impatient? It wasn't my first time using a sprayer, but I also wouldn't call myself experienced. I'm thinking it might be a good idea to just grab a gallon of the pre-mix roundup from the big box store and smack it hard - remember I'm on a time crunch with the PV and need this stuff to die fast.


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## livt0ride (Jan 10, 2021)

It just takes time for it to go brown. You will start seeing signs. It took mine several weeks to completely turn.


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## timmybluegrass (Oct 19, 2020)

Honestly, I don't know. @g-man is likely a better source. There are certainly pros that will spray gly and seed on the same day. I think if I were in your situation I would scalp and seed ASAP. If you can dethatch prior to seeding to get a decent amount of that dead - or soon to be dead - stuff out, that'd be better, but you certainly don't need to get all of it. Frankly, from my reno experience, leaving a little behind is actually helpful.

The biggest thing you are working against is time. I realize it is hot where you are but it ain't going to stay that way for much longer. And PV is such a slow grass to grow from seed. I'd working on getting seed in the ground and realize that this while this might not be the picture perfect reno you had in mind, VERY few renos actually are.


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## rmengel (Jul 12, 2021)

Based on everyone's advice, I've pulled the schedule ahead.

I got up super early this morning and dethatched it real good, and this is what it looks like now:



This afternoon I'll sneak out for one last hit of gly, then attempt to top dress tonight... although I'll likely run out of daylight.

Tomorrow morning I'll finish up topdressing (if needed), hit it with tenacity, and SEED DOWN. Peat may not happen until Friday morning, depending on the chaos that ensues over the next 24 hours.


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## lbb091919 (Apr 26, 2020)

Is it possible to mow it lower? The bottom corner looks pretty long.


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## rmengel (Jul 12, 2021)

I mowed it at the lowest setting on my lawn boy rotary yesterday, but I was thinking the same thing when I looked at the picture. It doesn't look as bad in person.

That said, I think I'm gonna take your advice here and run it over again during my lunch break.


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## lbb091919 (Apr 26, 2020)

You can also go at it with a string trimmer. You definitely want to thin that area out.


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## g-man (Jun 15, 2017)

Since it is provista, skip the tenacity. You can use gly next year to kill the weeds. Do mow lower below the mower settings, let the deck touch the dirt. Drop the seed and keep it moist. What is this topdressing for?


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## Stuofsci02 (Sep 9, 2018)

Since this is PV, I'd be less concerned about waiting for everything to die. You can do gly again next year. That's why you got PV I assume. You can take care of problems post reno that everyone else need to solve ahead of time. You can't roll back the clock three weeks though.


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## rmengel (Jul 12, 2021)

@g-man I mowed it super low last night and top dressed late into the night/this morning. I know I could have grown grass without the top dressing, but the lawn was so incredibly unlevel that I had to do something about it. It's not good enough for a reel mower, but it's better than it was, and the reel mowing can be next year's problem.

As for Tenacity, I decided to go for it anyway. Here's why:
- Tenacity will give the PV a leg up on the weeds when it comes to germination. Can't hurt.
- My lawn has historically had a weed problem, and I'd be naive to think that there arent some weed seeds lurking
- PV isn't gly tolerant for 6-8 months, and it's super slow growing, so I'll be lucky if I get a single mow this season to take out weeds that grow taller than the grass.
- It only took 15 minutes out of my day (remember, this is only 900 square feet)

Anyway, it's all ready for seed down. I'll get pictures once the greatest person in the world (aka the woman who puts up with me and my crazy habits) gets back from work... my phone's camera is currently messed up.


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## rmengel (Jul 12, 2021)

Update: Seed is down!

I also spread a very very thin layer of peat over it.

Sprinklers are running for two minutes every two hours from 8am to 4pm, I'll adjust as needed.

I think I'm also going to do a few test pots of this stuff on the back porch tonight, specifically to do some testing on how early I can get away with spraying gly, fert levels, and other various guinea-pigging. There's also some leftover peat, so growing in pure peat might be a fun science project.


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## timmybluegrass (Oct 19, 2020)

Biggest thing with gly is that you want to work off multiples of the 32oz/A rate depending on your tolerance for turf damage. You do NOT want to do the same rate you'd do for a reno. That is going to do super severe damage to mature PV and kill young PV. Ask me how I know. hahaha


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## rmengel (Jul 12, 2021)

timmybluegrass said:


> Biggest thing with gly is that you want to work off multiples of the 32oz/A rate depending on your tolerance for turf damage. You do NOT want to do the same rate you'd do for a reno. That is going to do super severe damage to mature PV and kill young PV. Ask me how I know. hahaha


LOL - I'm definitely going to put the test pots to work on any gly applications.

Side note about gly - I'm actually mildly terrified of accidentally creating any gly-tolerant weeds, so my game plan for this yard is to use conventional weed control for my blanket apps, and then only use spot apps of gly as a bit of a last resort.


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## rmengel (Jul 12, 2021)

Well here she is... it honestly looks like crap in the picture but I promise it's scalped.

I took this picture only a few minutes ago, roughly 16 hours after seed down.

There's a layer of topsoil to level things out, then seed, then rolled in, then *very* lightly topdressed with peat.


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## rmengel (Jul 12, 2021)

Just checking in here, now 5 days out from seed down

Obviously, there's no germination (expecting to see that start to happen at two weeks from seed down, aka Sept 16-ish).

However, we are getting rain tonight. Saying a prayer to mother nature that nothing washes out...


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## livt0ride (Jan 10, 2021)

Hope it works out for you. I am late to the game and don't have seed down yet, but I am in UT and temps are still in the 90s. Going to start cooling down in a week or two.


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## rmengel (Jul 12, 2021)

Are you doing PV? If so I would just throw seed down now. It's not worth waiting. PV takes forever to germinate and by the time it comes up, your temps will be lower.

Just keep it wet and make sure you throw down tenacity about a day before seed down.


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## rmengel (Jul 12, 2021)

Just went out to do my usual lunchtime check, and I noticed a couple very very very small grass babies.

It's probably way too early to claim victory, as this seems really early for PV to germinate, but hopefully by tonight or tomorrow we will know for sure whether those are actually the PV, or just some noxious grass that survived the gly

edit: we are exactly one week from seed down today. Night pictures coming as soon as it gets dark.


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## rmengel (Jul 12, 2021)

Here are a couple pics from last night. If you look closely, you can see a bunch of little green grass babies coming up!

Last night (when this was taken) was exactly 1 week after seed down. Very impressive.





I'm not going to let this count as "germination" because only neurotic people (such as ourselves) that go out at night with a flashlight would be able to see it, but if it becomes visible to the naked eye today, I'll count today as germination day.


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## rmengel (Jul 12, 2021)

Checking in - 10DAS, 0DAG

We now have grass babies visible to the non-analytical human eye across the whole lawn. I'm calling today the first official day of germination.


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## livt0ride (Jan 10, 2021)

Nice. Can't wait to see how it fills in since you were rushed.


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## rmengel (Jul 12, 2021)

Still in sprout and pout. However, germination seems pretty good, but a few things to note:


I got a little bit of fungus in an area that actually sees less water than the area that didn't have fungus. Dialed back watering and it seems to be receding.

The more heavily watered areas seem to be germinating better, but so far it's been pretty good all around

Bonus observations from the part of my lawn that got PV *sod* a few weeks ago:


The part of my lawn that was sodded with provista (not really the topic of this journal) started to take root around the 6 day mark, and was fully rooted by day 10. It's been growing like crazy and needs almost daily mowing (probably because I over-water it).


The color isn't the best, but it responds well to N and Iron. I'm going to hit it with N+I+PGR this weekend to see if I can darken it. up.

I'm wondering when would be the right time to hit the new seedlings with P+K, as my soil is deficient in both.


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## rmengel (Jul 12, 2021)

Got some pictures! 13 DAS, 3 DAG

Super happy with germination in the spots where it's actually germinating. The other spots seem to be just starting out with very small seedlings.

Here is the usual shot:



Here's another from the other side of the lawn


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## Thick n Dense (May 7, 2019)

@rmengel

Better germination time but seems like some of it is taking longer. Odd huh ?

What lb/k did you go with ?


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## rmengel (Jul 12, 2021)

Thick n Dense said:


> @rmengel
> 
> Better germination time but seems like some of it is taking longer. Odd huh ?
> 
> What lb/k did you go with ?


I went with 2.5lb/k.

Right now it's starting to tiller, but the west and south edges have considerably worse germination than the north and east sides of the lawn.

I did cheat a little bit on Monday and sprinkle some VERY LIGHT perennial rye seed in the spots that didn't germinate well, because the boss says we must have green stuff by halloween, and I figure I can blast away the rye with glyphosate in the late spring when the kbg starts to spread. Plus, it was only one handful of rye-very light application in targeted spots.


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## Thick n Dense (May 7, 2019)

@rmengel

How's she looking?

Slow? :lol:


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## rmengel (Jul 12, 2021)

@Thick n Dense VERY slow.

Sorry for being so slow to respond. It's been chaotic lately for me and now that things are slowing down I have more internet time.

IIRC you were hesitant to post photos of your reno at certain stages. So am I, but I'm going to do it anyway because I'm curious what y'all think

The grass seems to be getting toward the end of sprout and pout. Yes, sprout and pout. In the SPRING!



I'm curious if you think it's ready for a little nitrogen. IIRC I gave it a trivial amount via spray in the fall, but it hasn't seen any fert since.


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## aug0211 (Sep 5, 2017)

How did this progress?


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## Thick n Dense (May 7, 2019)

rmengel said:


> @Thick n Dense VERY slow.
> 
> Sorry for being so slow to respond. It's been chaotic lately for me and now that things are slowing down I have more internet time.
> 
> ...


Yup very slow hahah.

In another post, someone that had talked with Scotts said this is partially a reason why they're not making seed available commercially.

Takes special care and patience.

How's she looking now ? !


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## rmengel (Jul 12, 2021)

@Thick n Dense

I'll post a pic after work, but it's still slowly filling in. I'd say about 80% of the bare spots you see are gone. The area in the "back" of the last pic is still struggling so I threw down some seed and dusted it with peat last week, which means that sprinkler zone is now going to do a ton of light infrequent watering (ugh)

Fortunately, I did do some spot spraying with gly last month and the grass tolerated it well. Hopefully the pre-spray of this area with tenacity will hold off the bulk of the weeds until I can start dialing back the watering and avoid using any more gly this season.

For what it's worth, this grass is beautiful. The only complaint I'd have is that it's thirsty as hell. Also, the fact that it grows slowly means that it recovers very very slowly from damage, and the usual 10-12" diameter spread that you'd expect in a single season for regular KBG does not apply here. I know fall is peak growing season, but from what I've seen with this stuff, I don't think it's reasonable to expect a single plant to spread more than 3 or 4 inches in a single season.


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## rmengel (Jul 12, 2021)

Here's the latest update. As you can see there are many many weeds here that I can't do anything about (except hand pull) because I seeded the problem areas. I just noticed germination in many of the problem areas tonight.

My plan for the rest of the season:
1. Keep up light and infrequent watering (ugh)
2. Spot spray glyphosate at the end of this month in problem spots that aren't near newly germinated grass
3. Starter fert 9/22 (I put some down before seeding as well)

The one question I have is whether or not I should throw down prodiamine at the end of October? (Assuming I'm happy with germination). I worry because I'm not sure if it will prevent rhizome growth, particularly since this stuff is already a slow spreader


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## Chris LI (Oct 26, 2018)

A Prodiamine app may need to wait a little longer, but double check the timing. It might be 60 DAG. Do you have Tenacity? I believe you can use it 30 DAG. Usually it's at seed down and then again (30 DAG, if I remember correctly). I'm not sure if it matters if you miss the seed down app. If it's 30 DAG and you go with Tenacity, then Prodiamine 30 days after that.


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## rmengel (Jul 12, 2021)

I did two apps of tenacity before seed down. My main concern with doing it again is that the 30DAG recommendation is based on normal grass. This stuff is SLOW...

Keep in mind that this is gly tolerant grass. I think the best course of action is to just spot gly the weeds (knowing that a little over spray won't hurt) and then prodiamine early next spring


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## desmorider804 (11 mo ago)

rmengel said:


> Here's the latest update. As you can see there are many many weeds here that I can't do anything about (except hand pull) because I seeded the problem areas. I just noticed germination in many of the problem areas tonight.
> 
> My plan for the rest of the season:
> 1. Keep up light and infrequent watering (ugh)
> ...


Wow, That looks really good for 1yr old grass. Looks like a nice, rich, dark green in color. How many pounds of N did you apply to it during the year? I hope that mine turns out as good.


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## Ben4Birdies (12 mo ago)

Wow, that is painfully slow. Sorry you have to deal with such a long process. I sure hope you don't need a reno for a long, long time. Especially since I'm not sure how you kill a glyphosate resistant lawn.

I'm looking forward to seeing how things progress, hopefully the most difficult period is behind you!


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## rmengel (Jul 12, 2021)

desmorider804 said:


> rmengel said:
> 
> 
> > Here's the latest update. As you can see there are many many weeds here that I can't do anything about (except hand pull) because I seeded the problem areas. I just noticed germination in many of the problem areas tonight.
> ...


Thanks! I've been using mostly starter fert all year, so I'm not exactly sure what the total N weight came out to be (I was going with bag rate starter monthly). I just switched to liquid N .25lb every two weeks.

I could probably push it harder, but I'd rather it take longer than screw it all up


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