# TheSwede 2020 Journal



## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

OK, so realized that I should have started a new journal for 2020 instead of continuing to post to 2019 reno journal, so here goes...

To sum things up, the winter was "meh" with pretty much no snow and record high temperatures (WAY over what is common up here). This in combination of a somewhat late reno start had the unforseen effect that the new lawn has a substantial Poa A infestation that I need to deal with.

So, Last weekend I put down the first application of PreM (prodiamine). Poa seedheads where just about showing so I needed to get that done asap. The strategy to battle the poa is to do multiple low rate apps with Tenacity -I'll do 10 apps, about 4 days apart at 1.6oz/acre rate. Hopefully that will hurt it enough, but if it is still a problem I'll bite the bullet and try to get hold of some poa constrictor for a fall programme.
Before first app:



5 days into the program, the annoying little blue flowers are completely toasted. Poa is lighting up slitghtly, but does not look like it is really suffering yet. KBG looks like it is thriving. However, it is now clear to me just how much poa is in the lawn. It is a *lot* and not something you can spot treat so I'll continue to do blanket apps of tenacity.



Close up on "slightly tenacity lit up" poa:


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

So, what do you think? 2oz/acre Tenacity once a week or something else, to hurt the Poa? Some papers on the subject indicate 1.6/acre two times/week will give good results. Temperatures has been in the 60s last few days (with 45+ during night) but will be in the 50F range the next 10 days (32F as lowest during nights). The irony of it all is that it is actually colder here now, than in January and February(!)....


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## Babameca (Jul 29, 2019)

Hi, I am a bit confused here. You said you had to put down Prodiamine while Poa seed heads are on, and then 10 apps...of Prodiamine? I assume you wanted to say tenacity. And why 10 apps below min rate for Tenacity. Maybe I have missed something...


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

Babameca said:


> Hi, I am a bit confused here. You said you had to put down Prodiamine while Poa seed heads are on, and then 10 apps...of Prodiamine? I assume you wanted to say tenacity. And why 10 apps below min rate for Tenacity. Maybe I have missed something...


Ah, it should have read "multiple low rate apps with Tenacity". I found an article discussing various multi-app tenacity programmes and I think @g-man has done (or might even be doing one now) a series of low rate tenacity app as post emergance control for PoaA.

However, since I probably have lower air and soil temperatures than most of you right now, I am wondering if I perhaps should space the apps apart a bit more. The article talks about temperature being a factor for the metabolization, and I've seen others suggesting a 2oz/acre rate once a week (instead of the article's 1.6oz/acre twice a week). Maybe I'm just overthinking it?


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## g-man (Jun 15, 2017)

There are multiple approach to this. What I believe is happening is that tenacity is starving the POA a to death via the lack of chlorophyll. For this to work, the plant needs a slow death. Too much once will send it to be dormant and it will recover. Too early on the season or no moisture or no nitrogen can have the same effect. I think I read a study that starting in May/June was better so it gets finished with the summer heat.

I have poa a in my reno. I did 4oz/a rate with plans of 2oz/a. But things got cold and dry here. Tenacity finally turned it white and it pushed it to send seeds (normal). Since conditions are not optimal, I'm going to wait for more tenacity. I used the bleaching effect to go and hand pull. I got a decent percent out of the yard. I will continue with 2oz/a rate in a week or so. I reapply once I notice a slight recovery from peak bleaching.


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

@g-man , thanks for the info -weather here has been OK so far but now there will be what looks like 10 days of cooler weather so I think I'll hold off with the Tenacity apps until warmer weather again. I have been hand-pulling some of it but it is just too much to be practical. The strategy right now is to try to supress it as much as possible using tenacity, hope that it the summer heat will kill off some more and then possibly hit it again in fall with ethofumesate if needed.

So far (one app of 2oz/a and two @ 1.6/acre) 5% of the poa a have more or less turned white and 50% looks pale and suffering. On the other hand, about 25% looks just barely affected and 5% looks more or less completely unaffected.


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

Another week of working long hours, but then 4 days off thanks to "Walpurgis Night". Finally starting to see some results from the Tenacity-program I'm doing. I've hold off the apps due to some cold weather, and during that time the POA started to look more and more yellow. It's not the full bleach effect, but the Tenacity seems to hurt it slowly (it dosn't really show in the pictures but the color is quite off now, making the lawn look ugly as hell, but I only care about getting rid of the POA right now...):





Then there was a disruption of about a day since a guy down the street decided to put his young quales in a tiny cage on the ground in his garden. This, of-course, one of our cat noticed so he went over, put his paw through the 1,5x4" openings in the net and got hold of one or two of them. The neighbor went full nuclear, threatened my wife, threatened to kill our cat if we did not keep in locked up and demaded a redicilously high compensation. Thing is that in Sweden domestic cats are allowed to run free for say the last 1000 years or so, they are allowed to freely move around and hunt for pray, and it is up to each property owner to block access to those parts of the property that you do not want cats to access. This guy however, didn't really want to accept that putting a 2ft by 4ft cage with 8 quales unattended on the ground, with a mesh size so large that a cat or a fox easilly can reach into the cage, probably isn't a great idea if the objective is to keep those quales alive. To bad my cat had this idiot in his territory, because now I have to somehow deal with this nutcase (who I have tried my best to avoid due to his almost legendary reputation of being a royal PITA to his closest neighbors)...

Anyway, I got some work done in the garden the next day. Cut down an old bush to make space for a couple mini-greenhouses. I bought two but I only had time to put one together today. Maybe if I water it it will grow into a large greenhouse in a couple seasons... .







Still looking for a reel mower but things are slow here and I am getting second thoughts if it is wise to invest in one during these uncertain times...


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## Mark B (May 30, 2019)

I lol'd at your story about your cat and the quails :lol: I had a hunter cat until she passed last year, she hunted until she was 15 years old, if that is the nature of the animal there is not much to do to control it. Hope that neighbour is not too much trouble for you, some people find it very difficult to say "my bad" and accept responsibility. They often have health problems as a result.

Following your progress with the tenacity war against poa annua, wishing you success. :thumbup:


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## RasmusAnd (Aug 29, 2018)

Fellow Scandinavian here. I have been following your journals for a while now with high interest due to your location, robot lawnmower and of course your project.

I have a lot of Poa A in my lawn and would like to reduce it/get rid of it, so I was wondering if you are willing to share how you got your hands on tenacity?


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

Hi @RasmusAnd
Before you try Tenacity for Poa A control, make sure your turf mix can handle the stress of multiple apps. My lawn is 100% KBG so it will cope with up to 8 fl oz/acre acording to the label. Fine fescue and prennial rygrass, which are very common in nordic mixes are a bit more sensitive and according to the label no more than 5 fl oz/acre should be applied. Since the Poa A program I an doing is "off label use" with a total of 16fl oz/acre over a 7 week period your mix may react badly to it depending of what it consist of. Others that have tried a similar program to mine on fine fescue and/or PRG needs to answer if it will work or not.

Regarding the channel I use for getting hold of these products, I would like to keep that for my self -the more people that use it, the higher the possibility it will be noticed the channel will be shut down. I hope you understand.


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## RasmusAnd (Aug 29, 2018)

TheSwede said:


> Hi @RasmusAnd
> Before you try Tenacity for Poa A control, make sure your turf mix can handle the stress of multiple apps. My lawn is 100% KBG so it will cope with up to 8 fl oz/acre acording to the label. Fine fescue and prennial rygrass, which are very common in nordic mixes are a bit more sensitive and according to the label no more than 5 fl oz/acre should be applied. Since the Poa A program I an doing is "off label use" with a total of 16fl oz/acre over a 7 week period your mix may react badly to it depending of what it consist of. Others that have tried a similar program to mine on fine fescue and/or PRG needs to answer if it will work or not.
> 
> Regarding the channel I use for getting hold of these products, I would like to keep that for my self -the more people that use it, the higher the possibility it will be noticed the channel will be shut down. I hope you understand.


Of course, I respect that.

Thanks for the advice.


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

Mark B said:


> I lol'd at your story about your cat and the quails :lol: I had a hunter cat until she passed last year, she hunted until she was 15 years old, if that is the nature of the animal there is not much to do to control it. Hope that neighbour is not too much trouble for you, some people find it very difficult to say "my bad" and accept responsibility. They often have health problems as a result.
> 
> Following your progress with the tenacity war against poa annua, wishing you success. :thumbup:


Yeah, about the neighbor I think I have him sorted out now. I had to be, lets say "a bit firm with him" in the communication, to get the message through, so while he still has his quales in this sorry excuse for a cage I do not think he will bother us anymore...

Poa war continues -cold spells up here is making things complicated. Right now I am just eyeballing the Poa A and how it looks to make apps. Right now, the colder it gets, the further apart I will space apps. If it looks like it is starting to recover I will hit it with another app...


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

Have been working way to much lately so I took the afternoon off to do some gardening just to decompress. We actually had snow falling here yesterday but today temperatures normalized a bit (but it will be around freezing point during the late night).

Mowed the lawn low with my rotary. I've realized that for me, mowing is very therapeutic -the work stress just melts away when I mow. The lawn has this uneven/patchy growth that i recognize from my previous renos and new establishments so I violated the 1/3 rule but I don't care. I think it starts to look pretty decent, but I would look even better with a reel mower @ 1". Just got to get my hands on one! The lamp post needs to go -it is ugly and the position of it after adding the retaining wall is just...strange:


When it comes to the Poa war I did another app of 1.6 floz/acre of Tenacity today, together with the second half of the split Prodiamine app. Most of the Poa A looks really pale now. Some I would classify as dead, but a few still looks surprisingly healthy. It is hard to make the true color come out right on a photo, but if you click on the picture and zoom in you can compare the color of the KBG with the color of the Poa and you'll see that it looks pretty white now, but there is still some chlorophyll in it:


I don't know what to expect here, but surly if I do a few more apps of Tenacity, Poa A that looks like this today most probably would be dead in a few weeks, right?


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## Chris LI (Oct 26, 2018)

^+1
On the overworking and mowing therapy! I'm in the same boat. Glad to see the lawn is waking up. Color and density look good. :thumbup:

Maybe you could relocate the light pole behind the retaining wall.

FYI-I've been mowing this spring, mostly with a manual reel mower at 1.5", and love it! Mine was inherited, but they're not too expensive to purchase. Maybe a little TLF peer pressure can guide you into purchasing one? :mrgreen:


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

Chris LI said:


> ^+1
> On the overworking and mowing therapy! I'm in the same boat. Glad to see the lawn is waking up. Color and density look good. :thumbup:
> 
> Maybe you could relocate the light pole behind the retaining wall.
> ...


Yes, the lawn is really starting to take of now and I am really happy with the color so far. Several neighbors have complemented it already, but I know that this lawn is nowhere near its full potential yet. Up here it is very common to lay SOD and a couple of my neighbors thought I was a *complete* idiot that decided to go through the tedious process of seeding the lawn instead of lay SOD. This week both of them have asked me why their lawns looks so much less green than mine. Now they know the difference between a typical SOD-lawn consisting of mostly fine fescue and a lawn seeded with 100% KBG. 

Good idea about relocating the lamp post -if I can get the wiring done without too much hassle I will probably move it. If it turns out to be a bigger job I'll probably just remove it and have another one installed later in the fall. Up here the summer days are long so you don't really need the lamp post until fall/winter time. Currently the sun is up from 4 in the morning to 10 in the evening and in about a month it will only be dark for about three hours per night.

About the mower, I grew up with a Husqvarna manual reel mower that my dad had bought back in the late 60s and as part of the household chores me and my brother had to mow the entire lawn with it. We hated it and we tried our best to break it but it was built like a tank and we never managed to break it. When me and my brother had moved out it took about two days before he had bought himself a self propelled rotary mower... Anyway, for me, I'm done with the muscle powered reel mowers. I want a big, heavy, petrol-smelling pro grade reel mower!


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## Chris LI (Oct 26, 2018)

:nod: :thumbup:


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

I don't know if Poa A is darker up here or if KBG is lighter but it has been a challenge to show the progress of my Poa A program using my phone's cam. Today I pulled out one of the bigger Poa A weeds from the area treated with Tenacity that still looks like it is going to survive and compared it with Poa A not beeing hit with Tenacity (there are still some KBG leafs in both samples so disregard the darkest colored "Poa"...):



A couple more apps as temps are going back from insanely cold to more normal, and I hope 90% of it will be dead in a month!


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

The reno has really taken off the last week despite of all the chemicals I have thrown at it. The typical uneven, wavy/patchy growth of a new lawn, wife has dubbed it "The Cellulite Field" . 


I've also dubbed part of the lawn Poa Alley -it is like there is this "yellow brick road" of Poa A rippling through my KBG-lawn starting wide and then getting narrower ending by the mini greenhouses. The second pic was captured in the very last light of the day so colors are way off, but you can see the difference between KBG and Poa after multiple apps of Tenacity:


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## Chris LI (Oct 26, 2018)

Stay the course, but you already know that. I predict in 4-5 weeks you will have something to be proud of. :thumbup:


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

Chris LI said:


> Stay the course, but you already know that. I predict in 4-5 weeks you will have something to be proud of. :thumbup:


@Chris LI, thanks! I think I am finally starting to understand what I achieved last season. While I would have liked a mono strand lawn, I did not have the time to find a supplier up here, so I had to kind of settle for a 100% KBG mix.

However, today (which is a national holiday where i live, and which i devoted to garden work, naturally...) me and Ms Swede took a timeout from "the infinite ware against nature that is impossible to win" (my father's description of keeping a decent garden ). and just chill out for a few moments in the small lounge area overlooking the reno, armed with two glasses and a bottle of red from Napa Valley.

It just occurred to me, that "hey, if I really want a mono strand, I don't have to do all this hard labor all over again -you can just nuke the now almost perfectly level lawn, throw out some mono strand seed, and have a mono strand lawn in a couple months". Still, the reno looks so good I'll keep it at least another season before I decide to go mono (if I ever do...).

Regarding finding a pro-grade reel mower the chase continues. The few sellers I have found are all asking way too much. I don't think they've realized that with COVID-19 the market is pretty much *dead* for these dinosaurs -only nostalgic enthusiasts will even contemplate to buy these things, and that is only if they're lucky enough to still have a job to go to, which isn't certain at all during this bizarre global lock-down we're all affected by...


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

Fast forward 10 days from the pics above and I now have this:



Most of the Poa A has been more or less obliterated, but there's still a few spots where I think it might survive. The lawn is stressed from the Poa program -in addition to the frequent Tenacity apps I have turned down irrigation to an absolute minimum to try to dry out the Poa, but yesterday I decided that I'll hold off further apps since the lawn looks a bit too stressed right now. Whatever Poa A is left I will hand pull and hopefully the lawn will get back to its deep green color in the coming weeks, and the bare spots will disappear.

When it comes to mower I have found a Toro Flex21 that might just barely end up within my budget depending on my negotiation skills. The price needs to come down a bit from the asking price since I need to rebuild it to allow for higher HOCs but we'll see in the next few weeks how it goes. I'm not in a hurry so I can bide my time and wait for a decent deal. Especially since I am more intrigued by a JD 220E than a Toro, but if I can get a Toro for a decent price I'll go for it.


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

TheSwede said:


> When it comes to mower I have found a Toro Flex21 that might just barely end up within my budget depending on my negotiation skills. The price needs to come down a bit from the asking price since I need to rebuild it to allow for higher HOCs but we'll see in the next few weeks how it goes. I'm not in a hurry so I can bide my time and wait for a decent deal. Especially since I am more intrigued by a JD 220E than a Toro, but if I can get a Toro for a decent price I'll go for it.


OK, so I stumbled upon a Flex21, at an online auction site a few days ago. Basically the only info available was "1035hrs, runs but has not been used in the last 12 months" accompanied by a couple pictures of the unit. Now, pro-grade single unit reel mowers like JD220 or Toro Greensmasters do not show up on the second hand market particularly often up here, and the asking price is usually high (a serviced Flex21 from 2011 with 1000hrs graded as a "3"(of five) has a $3000+ asking price...).

So, I decided to make a bid, 20 bucks over the current highest bid, about an hour before the acution ended and...well, I guess I am now the owner of a mystery Toro Greensmaster Flex21 :banana: !

Still havn't picked it up yet since the payment is processing but I hope I can pick it up next week to see if my gamble payed off...



I realize I will most likely need to spend several hundred bucks to get it refurbished and ready to mow (perhaps even more if something is seriously wrong). Apart from that I will probably have to convert it into to a High HOC version and I am looking into what is needed for that (I know I need to remove the groomer for fitting the high HOC kit, and if I remove the groomer I will need some additional parts to get it all back together). My personal target HOC is probably around 0.5" so part of me is just telling me to skip the high HOC kit and just bring it up to 0.5" and mow the damn lawn! :twisted:

Wow...I just realized I am already making plans for this mystery unit that everyone else thougth was worth less than I payed, and which I havn't even seen IRL yet, let alone seen working -I am just way to pumped up for my own good about this purchase!?!


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## Stuofsci02 (Sep 9, 2018)

@TheSwede Congrats. Looks just like my 2010 that I bought over the winter with 1280 hours. Should be a great machine! Something weird is going on with your transport wheels, but you might not need them.


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

Stuofsci02 said:


> @TheSwede Congrats. Looks just like my 2010 that I bought over the winter with 1280 hours. Should be a great machine! Something weird is going on with your transport wheels, but you might not need them.


Hehe, I've learned that it is transport "rollers" used in conjunction with a special Toro trailer that will guide and hold the mower using special rails on the trailer. This way the operator won't have to attach/detach the transport wheels at every site and thus it will save a ton of time (and money). I'm thinking of removing the transport wheel axles as part of the refurbishing since I have a retaining wall that I want to mow as close as possible to.

Since the only entry point into my yard from my garage is to negotiate a 7 step steep staircase, one of the all to many summer projects that has been bumped up with this insane reel-mower purchase, is to build a "reel-shed" (not a she-shed!) at lawn level where "the beast" can get some weather protection and all the other stuff that is now laying in random piles all around the property can be stowed away properly. With the Flex21 I will need to modify my original design with a designated door for the mower, but all, in all, I hope to have the shed completed in a few weeks depending on what insane curve balls my employer throws at me the following weeks...


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## Chris LI (Oct 26, 2018)

Congrats on the Flex 21! I hope that is a good find that works out for you.


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

The last week has been good for the lawn -the super aggressive Poa A treatment with Tenacity in combination with a, lets say "bold concentration" of T-NEX was perhaps pushing the outside of the envelope a bit too far for a fairly newly established KBG lawn with a pretty uneven growth pattern. Parts of the lawn where yellowing a bit too much for my liking so I decided to end the Tenacity apps and hold back with T-NEX for now and let the grass rebound. As far as I can tell, 99% of the Poa A is gone, grass is growing at a nuclear level so I have mowed every other day just to keep it at a reasonable height -guess that's due to the PGR rebound and me putting down some fert (21-4-7) in combination with nature graciously providing the lawn text-book percipitation and temperature over the last week.

Couldn't resist a "Covid-19 mow" this morning (you know, "working from home" and all that...) and while it is still growing disturbingly uneven, the lawn looks really good now, IMHO.

The usual pic from the stairs, this time 9 in the morning after a mow with the rotary:


I have never seen decent stripes from my rotary before, but as it seems, mowing in the morning creates stripes:


Fast Forward until this evening. I mow at the lowest setting with my rotary which is about 1.5" -the lawn is farily dense and color is good:


The tell signs of a rotary (newly sharpened BTW)-all those grass tips that are grayish, almost white from beeing torn, rather than cut:


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## g-man (Jun 15, 2017)

It looks great. Your hard work is paying off. I'm glad the tnex worked so good in the POA a.


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

Chris LI said:


> Congrats on the Flex 21! I hope that is a good find that works out for you.


Thanks, @Chris LI, I sure hope it is a good find too -my adorable, lovely wife since so many years, shall we say, is not at all "into the intricate details of reel mowing"....but over the years having to deal with me, she has developed a certain immunity and acceptance towards my "hobbies". Today, she walked out barefoot early in the morning, on the new lawn and said "what about that old, wierd looking mower you've purchased -can we get the grass even thicker and lower with that mower?"

-I *really* love that woman!


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

g-man said:


> It looks great. Your hard work is paying off. I'm glad the tnex worked so good in the POA a.


Yes, your advice around T-NEX and Poa control really payed off for me -my mistake was that I went for a full T-NEX app while doing multiple Tenactity apps. I went for like 20 fl oz/acre (13ml/1ksqft) of T-NEX which is way too much on a patially established lawn. It turned brown where the KBG hadn't established fully. I backed off and lucklilly for me the PoaA seems to be gone now, KBG grows like crazy...thanks again for your advice!


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## Greasmatta (Jun 3, 2019)

What is the strategi for POA and PGR/Tenacity?

I have ordered a couple of liters of mesotrione (Tenacity) and a big can of 25% trinexapac ethyl (PGR). And some surfactant.
I got my share of the mild winter poa attack.


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

Well, I decided to do a series of low rate Tenacity applications that has been shown to be effective against Poa A (see https://archive.lib.msu.edu/tic/golfd/article/2012oct33.pdf). Technically this is off-label use (not something that is described in the Tenacity label), so it is not something that the supplier recommends, but since a lot of people have tried and had success, I thought I'd give it a go. According to the study in the link above, the method should be more effective in the late summer than in the spring.

Note that I have a 100% KBG lawn so you need to research how a treatment like mine will affect your red fescue before starting a treatment like mine.

At some point @g-man PMed me about possibly trying T-NEX as well, since it had been documented that it has an effect on Poa A as well. So I did. However, I kind of over-applied so the lawn got a disturbing, yellowish color tint to it, and some whitening of the *** as well, so I decided to hold off for a while in hopes that the lawn would recover.

I would say that my lawn is pretty much free of Poa A for the moment, and the KBG is thriving. We'll see in a month or so if the Poa will come back or if I managed to kill it off...


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

Picked up the mower today (a few days earlier than expected). Since the information on the auction site was very limited I had no idea what I had bought. Turns out the seller is actually retired (the guy is 75) and is pretty much continuing to buy and sell machines because he likes it. Got a very good feeling when I picked it up since he actually had 12 Flex21s just like the one I bought he said that if I don't like it for any reason I could come back and pick out another one. 

The unit is from 2007 and I must say from the quick check up I've done so far it seems like it has been very well kept. The unit has the carbide tipped helix groomer. The reel is pretty much at its EOL, but I knew that from the pictures of the unit. With my HOC target I'd probably would have switched it to an 8 blade reel anyway. The bedknife is very thin, so I think it's a bedknife for really low HOCs.

Anyway, the unit is fully functional, starts on first attempt and it did cut paper on every blade over the full width of the reel without any adjustments whatsoever (I hav a *lot* of tiny paper clippings on the driveway now...) -there was just a few tiny specs of rust on the reel edges that will be gone after some light back-lapping.

Took it for a dry-run (without engaging the reel) just to get a feel for it and it felt great! Big grin on my face -it's a monster!

I've decided to order an 8 blade reel and a new bedknife (better suited for the HOC i aim to maintain). I will also get the parts needed to remove the groomer and have the high-HOC kit mounted. I'll spend a few evenings to clean it up a bit and go over it in more detail to see if there's something else that needs to be replaced.


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## Chris LI (Oct 26, 2018)

That's a photo of a beautiful machine on a showcase lawn! It looks very happy there. :bandit:


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

Chris LI said:


> That's a photo of a beautiful machine on a showcase lawn! It looks very happy there. :bandit:


Thanks Chris! I am really happy with the result so far -the lawn isn't at its full potential yet but I get a lot of comments from the neighbors how good it looks (one even posted a picture on Facebook and asked how the h**l is one supposed to compete with neighbors like me :lol


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

So, I've been working a lot this week and havn't really had time to check out my new toy. There's a leaking bushing in the transmission that needs to be taken care of, but it is a small leak (a few drops per day) so it is not a big deal as long as you top up the transmission fluid level. I've ordered the parts and will probably change them after the season.

Now, I am somewhat of a "sleeper-thinker" so last night I somehow figured out that since the reel is really worn, and HOC specs are probably a bit conservative since the HOC limits depends on how worn the reel is, I realized that I just might be able to raise it up to max height, and the worn reel and conservative specs would help me get up to 3/4 or even more. Said and done, after work today I raised it up to max height and *drumroll* it maxed out at about 20mm, which is close enough to not violate the 1/3 rule too much:



Could I resist mowing @20mm? Hell NO! I just went for it -neighbors had some guests over for dinner outside so I just did a few test stripes not to disturb them too much. Struggled a bit to figure out how to best handle this beast, but in a couple of mows I think I've figured it all out. Got a lot of stragglers and also some washboarding but tomorrow I will do more adjustments and try to get it cleanly cut down to 20mm. Pictures of beautiful stripes will have to wait until I have this all figured out  :


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

Finally got around to do a full mow with the Greensmaster yesterday. Didn't really care about the stripes, just wanted to get a feel for the mower and get the lawn down to 20mm.


The lawn is healing up nicely after removing a gazillion Poa A patches.

Realized that I need to remove the transport wheel axles since sooner or later they'll catch the retaining wall and something might break, so today when I had an hour for myself I decided to remove them. It was kind of tricky since they had used ample amounts of thread locker, and this model doesn't have any place to put a wrench to lock the traction drum with (at least I could not find it...) but after some work I was able to get them off.





Then I started thinking about what to do with the groomer. It is in it's transport position but I can't get it to lift any higher than say 5mm below cut so with this worn reel it will allways be slightly engaged. So I lowered it a bit more to 10mm below HOC which is half the height of HOC and what they reccomend to start out on when using the groomer on a green). I actually think it helped me getting rid of more stragglers, but I am not sure.



Anyway, lawn looks really good now compared to just a few weeks ago. If I could just get the bare/weak spots where the Poa A used to grow I will be completely satisfied with the reno!


Allready thinking about dropping the HOC to 5/8" but then I'll need to do some dressing. Turns out there's a company producing USGA approved soil and sand products near by that I didn't know about and they're willing to sell to me. Will probably go for their 80/20 green dressing (80% sand 20%peat soil) 0.2-0.8mm fraction.


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

We'll get 1.5" of rain tomorrow which is the first rain to speak of for over two months so I put out some fert (21-4-7) and monsoon-secured the garden. The Flex 21 is safe under a tarp until the reel shed is ready! Spread a decent amount of fert but the lawn is so thick now, that it is only the granules that did not fall through that is visible...


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

Got 1" of rain the yesterday and today which was needed. However, woke up at 4 in the morning from the noise of falling tree branches. Aparently, I now have 2/3 of a plum tree...



So, on Friday we're celebrating "midsummers' eve" in the Nordics -an old norse tradition celebrating the summer solstice. I won't go into any details but usually the tradition involves eating wierd food, playing wierd lawn games (like "Kubb") and at some point doing wierd, coordinated dances in large groups around a "maypole". This, of course, is done while drinking ample amounts of alcohol.

With COVID-19 the big celebrations have been cancelled so us and the neighbors have decided we'll do our own "steeplechase celebration" so each family will host one of the weird traditions in their garden. It will be a ton of fun I think, but at the same time, I feel the pressure is on to deliver the ultimate Kubb lawn.

So today I had to remove the broken off branch, put it in the trailer and get it to the compost/recycling facility -it was a lot of work. Then I had to mow the lawn -that too, was a lot of work because the little fella had grown insanely the last two days, thanks to the fert, rain and perfect temperature (I also put down some PGR but I guess it kicks in with a slight delay...). I'll have to mow tomorrow as well to try to beat the stragglers into submission. And of course, I just had to put down some iron. I'm exhausted, but the lawn will be stellar, and that's all that matters, right?!?


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## g-man (Jun 15, 2017)

I think it is a sign that the tree has to go. That lawn needs the sun and the reel less obstacles.


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

g-man said:


> I think it is a sign that the tree has to go. That lawn needs the sun and the reel less obstacles.


 :lol:


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

What makes it possible to maintain a decent lawn up here is a combination of things. The Gulf Stream helps keeping the ocean a tad bit warmer up here, and with a costal location, winters are fairly mild (my lawn is located further north than Juno, Alaska, to put it in perspective). Living @59+° North makes days long during the summer, while temperatures are kept moderate (we get perhaps a few days above 90F in the summer, and humidity is low). The days are so long now in fact, that it actually does not get dark during the night... This picture is from Friday (Midsummers Eve) and it was taken at midnight:



The long days, it turns out, affect how I need to apply PGR -the GDD needs to be altered. Luckilly for me, STERF (Scandinavian Turfgrass and Environment Research Foundation) has figured it all out for me, so after the first "starter" PGR app I did about a week ago at half rate, I will now start to apply the rates and GDDs they recommend for my location and HOC.

So, today I finally got around actually doing a proper "take it down to 3/4" mow with the Toro. Since I took it down to 3/4" from say 1-1.5" I've had a *LOT* of stragglers that I just had to live with until I could find some time to do a thorough tripple pass. I ended up doing probably 5 passes to beat the longest stragglers into submission. There are still a few left, but they are living on borrowed time -mark my word! :twisted::





After the penta-pass session to get it to 99.8% 3/4" I applied [email protected] fl oz/1000sq ft. Fingers crossed!


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## Chris LI (Oct 26, 2018)

Nice carpet! :mrgreen:

Thanks for sharing the midnight photo. It's cool to see an actual photo of someone's yard with the summer light conditions in the upper latitudes. I've seen documentaries on TV of large landscapes, but not a local photo in a neighborhood. :thumbup:


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

I'm located well south of the arctic circle so our nights are not that bright but further north, above the arctic circle it is pretty close to daylight conditions in the middle of the night.

When it comes to the lawn I decided to finish the drip irrigation system since there was hot weather approaching so I hooked up another valve for the green-house area. Worked fantastic. Too bad I managed to disconnect a wire to the front yard valve in the process, which I realized today, after three days of 90F temps. I'm irrigating every 3 days now, but due to my mistake it has not run for almost a week and the lawn shows signs of stress. Hopefully I can get it back on track again with some water tonight...


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

There has been a shift in the weather since last post. From being warm and sunny it is now cool and it rains pretty much every day and according to weather service it will be so for the foreseeable future.... Good for the lawn, but bad for my insanely long summer vacation (I'll start tomorrow and go back to work August 10  ). With covid-19 pretty much preventing travel and such, a rainy summer will be mentally challenging, to say the least -living up here you need to catch every little sunray in the summer in order to stay sane during the long dark winter months...

With that said, I've laid down another app of T-NEX. Havn't mowed in three days and weather is preventing me from mowing right now -forecast for tomorrow looks promising, though...lawn is looking great, but Poa A is starting to pop up again, which is a bit worrying...



Apart from my own lawn, one of my team members husband is somewhat of a lawn nerd and during the last few weeks I have helped him design an irrigation system for part of his lawn (irrigation of residential lawns up here is very rare, but this guy keeps his own golf green since about two years back and realized an automated irrigation system will save a *lot* of time)... Today I went to their absolutely amazing, meticulously renovated, 1800th century house and sea side garden to help him start it all up.

I am *this* close to just selling my suburban 70s property and buying a place next door to them -it's on an island so you'll have to take the ferry to go to work which is a bit cumbersome, but seriously, I get 5 times the lawn size, and an absolutely gorgeous 1800 century house for the same money as my ugly brick house from 1978...and with covid-19 working from home is the new normal...


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## Greasmatta (Jun 3, 2019)

How is your Poa A battle going?

I will order some Poa Constrictor soon to add in my arsenal.
Then I will have Tenacity, Boxer+Legato and Poa Contsrictor. But no plan how to actually use them .
Any advise?

I have also been using PGR. At what GDD är you applying? I have read something about 150 GDD up here in Sweden but using that number does not even give me a 2 weeks interval. More around 10 days..


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## RCARASITI (Jul 25, 2020)

So do you feel the purchase of the greensmower was a game changer? I currently have a manual reel mower in 5k sqft bermuda and I am itching to buy one . I have my eye on a 2015 220e for around $1400 bucks..want to make sure it's worth the dirty looks from my wife.


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

Greasmatta said:


> How is your Poa A battle going?
> 
> I will order some Poa Constrictor soon to add in my arsenal.
> Then I will have Tenacity, Boxer+Legato and Poa Contsrictor. But no plan how to actually use them .
> ...


Sorry for the delayed response -have been spending the week in a remote cabin with pretty much no cell coverage the. Anyway, a fair amount of Poa has re-appeared, just as was expected since I did a spring app and since I cut it short due to some worrying color change in the KBG. Regarding Poa Constrictor I bought a bottle of 500g/litre ethofumesate from a european shop (PM me for details), so it is 50% rather than the 42%(?) in Poa Constrictor so you'd have to recalculate the amount of product to use to hit Poa Constrictor's recommended application rates for your grass type.

IIRC you have a KBG/fine fescue lawn mix so you need to read up on what ethofumestate will do to the fescue before applying it. Reccomendation for KBG is to to two to three apps in the fall, about4 weeks apart (if I remember correctly).

When it comes to PGR I am not sure I follow your question "at what GDD are you applying". I used STERFs evaluation of Primo MAXX as a guideline, and since I cut at 20mm I figured the tests done with fairway cut grass would be closest to my situation so I chose the application rate 1.2-2.0l/10000m2 as the test in Loimijoki, Finland in table 2 was on KBG. When it comes to selecting GDD before re-application, the general consensus is that for the more northern parts of Sweden, you need to compensate rates and lower the GDDs due to the long hours of daylight that will stimulate the grass growth more than further south. I just figured 190GDD would be a good staring point and for KBG and the application rate I have done so far (I have only done 5 apps I think) I seem to get about 2 weeks supression with no apparent rebound (last app was meant to go down the day before we went down south but rain prevented me from do the application and now I have some rebound to take care of...).


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

RCARASITI said:


> So do you feel the purchase of the greensmower was a game changer? I currently have a manual reel mower in 5k sqft bermuda and I am itching to buy one . I have my eye on a 2015 220e for around $1400 bucks..want to make sure it's worth the dirty looks from my wife.


I mean, manual reel mowers are surprisingly good at cutting grass. However, a greens mower gives you the rollers and the weight to create really nice stripes.

There are also many downsides of a greens mower compared to a rotary or a manual reel mower. For one thing, they are expensive to repair. They are also designed to cut grass in open spaces with plenty of space around the area beeing cut, so to bring one into a small garden with retaining walls, trees, sheds etc. can be somewhat of a challenge. However, the cut and stripes I get in return is well worth it! I'd say go for it!


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## Greasmatta (Jun 3, 2019)

Hello,
The question was at what application interval you are applying PGR. Where did you find GDD 190?
I see sterf mention 150 but that gives me barely 10 days interval.
Maybe I am using the greenkeeper app wrong.

I have a source for all the chemicals I need  Thank you anyway.

Do you know any good allround fungicide or active ingredient for us here up north for our common problems. This is all Greek to me.


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

Greasmatta said:


> Hello,
> The question was at what application interval you are applying PGR. Where did you find GDD 190?
> I see sterf mention 150 but that gives me barely 10 days interval.
> Maybe I am using the greenkeeper app wrong.
> ...


Ah, OK. Well, I think you have to experiment a bit to figure out exactly when and how much PGR to apply -the 150GDD mentioned I believe is for greens (which is the primary use case for Primo Maxx in the nordics). I used the table for fariways to get rates and approximate application intervals that did give a good supression without miscoloration and then looked at historical GDD data for that region and arrived at around 190-200, which was what I used. Looking at the graph "Reduction in clipping yield after application of two rates of Primo MAXX to creeping bentgrass at fairway mowing height" One can see that the growth rate takes about 10 days to slow down and then starts accelerating again, so if you want to have good supression I'd say you'd have to apply every other week (which is pretty much what I've been doing with my 190GDD target).

Fungicides is a big black empty space in my knowledge bank as well, so I can't really advice you. I'd say that snow mold is by far the big problem at our lattitudes since the climate is fairly dry and cool and outbreaks of dollar spot and other fungus in the summer time is unusual. I had quite a bit of snow mold in my lawn this winter so I am planning on reading up on what to use and when to apply it and then get hold of some fungicide that will work for snow mold. I know that dollar spot has made it's way over here as well but I think it is mostly a problem for greens up here.

If I find out what's best to use I'll let you know...


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

Finished the mini-shed today. Still needs another coat of paint, but all in all, I'm happy with the result. The Flex 21 now has a custom built space for it in the shed and on top of that a shelf for cushions. The gas, oil and other stuff is stored on a shelf between the cushions and the Flex21. A simple. removable wooden ramp makes it easy to get the Flex in and out of the shed. The back part of the shed is more standard layout with shelves for fert, sprayer, chemicals, shovels, rakes, trimmers and what not. It is small, but it is just what I need to have 95% of what is needed to keep a garden in good condition at an arm-lengths distance which was the goal.





The weather has been quite cool this summer so the lawn is REALLY thriving. Only downside to this farily wet and cool summer is the Poa A that is thriving just as much. I don't have any large patches, but I got hundreds of "individual" Poa A's that I will need to attack somehow.

I've started to use the groomer more aggressively now (set at 5mm, which is 15mm below HOC) and it seems like it is lifting up many of the seed heads of the Poa A so that the Flex can cut and collect them, which is good. Still, there are disturbingly many left behind...

Nevertheless, the lawn is just amazingly thick and lush now -I am seriously tempted to bring the HOC down to 5/8" in a week or two, but I probably should wait until next season to do that and concentrate on getting the lawn thicker and to fill in the few bare spots left.


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## Babameca (Jul 29, 2019)

@TheSwede It looks pretty darn good!


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## Mark B (May 30, 2019)

Nice update. Same as you on the poa A situation. I might take a shot at the tenacity regimen you linked a while back sometime in the next few months.


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

Babameca said:


> @TheSwede It looks pretty darn good!


@Babameca Thanks! Your former dirt patch does not look too bad either!


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

Mark B said:


> Nice update. Same as you on the poa A situation. I might take a shot at the tenacity regimen you linked a while back sometime in the next few months.


I'm contemplating a ethofumesate treatment this fall (aka Poa Constrictor, Progress) but I don't know if it will work for my KBG cultivars... I'll have to do a test on a small patch to see if my KBG strand will survive...


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

Quick update. Have been working on the garage (Ms Swede has *ordered* me to insulate the darn thing so we can move some stuff out of the house, which has very limited storage space) so I havn't had much energy left to post updates here.

Lawn is doing good for the most part. Still cutting at 20mm (3/4"). There's warm weather coming in. 80-90F (which is considered really hot up here!) but after the weekend when temperatures normalize I'll most likely drop it to 5/8". A few days ago I dropped some T-NEX and the first part of a split Prodiamine app. There are a few areas in the lawn that are weak -grass isn't growing as much and it looks a bit stressed, especially now, with the apps I did. Not sure what causes it, should be plenty of good soil underneath and it is watered properly. You can see one of the areas up left, near the retaining wall:



Also bidding on another Toro Flex 21...because I need to put something in my refurbished garage? No? :nod:


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## g-man (Jun 15, 2017)

Most likely the shade plus the extra moisture from the wall is giving you some trouble in that spot.


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## Babameca (Jul 29, 2019)

Looks mint! Can you get close up of the area.


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## jabopy (Nov 24, 2018)

Looking good the Swede&#128077; Bidding on another Toro flex!! I wondered how you got the lines with an auto mower. :shock: :lol:


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

jabopy said:


> Looking good the Swede👍 Bidding on another Toro flex!! I wondered how you got the lines with an auto mower. :shock: :lol:


Haha, updated the profile now...


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

Thanks, @g-man, @Babameca. area actually looks a bit dry which is strange (it has been a hot spell the last few days but the rest of the lawn is still pretty lush and no sign of heat stress). It has allways been thin, but I thought it would catch up. Anyway, here's a couple pictures of the area:





Maybe I need to look closer tomorrow when I get home -it just might be that the soil does not hold the water as good for some reason there, it evaporates much faster since it is thinner and shorter than the rest of the lawn, or I've accidentally over applied with the sprayer in that area? Perhaps since it is a weak spot I should have avoided applying PreM and PGR on it?


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

OK, so temps are dropping in the next few days. Expecting temperatures in the 60F range from Monday on (from 80+F today). 3/4" rain expected tonight but when it dries up I'll most likely drop the HOC to 5/8" and also let the N-blitz begin (somewhat delayed by the unusually hot weather the last few weeks).

Chilies have been refusing to ripe due to the cool summer but the last few weeks of warm weather has been good for them and they are finally starting to ripe in a rate that will make it possible to do a few fermented hot-sauces out of them -somewhat ironic, the Carolina Reapers are probably the most productive plants in my mini greenhouses, while the more sane varsities like my scotch bonnet browns are still green. Scotch Bonnet Yellows have started riping nicely in the last week, though. Guess I'll make insanely hot sauces this year. 

Apart from the chili growing concerns, tomorrow will be all about the infamous, insanely stinky, Swedish delicacy "fermented herring", aka "surströmming" ("sour herring"). I can't say I love it like some people say, but I don't mind eating this exceptionally stinky food since I've been eating it every year since I was very young. Anyways, it's a family tradition to come together and eat this truly bizarre food once a year so while I am totaly fine, my wife is not a huge fan.... This year we'll have to do it virtually, so it will be interesting to see if my 82 year old dad can manage to set up the video conference part of it.

The eating it part, obviously takes a bit of getting used to, unless you're born into it :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X9htB2hDAgM


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## Chris LI (Oct 26, 2018)

Nice selection on peppers! I grew Scotch Bonnets, Reapers and Jalapenos last year. This year, I went with a less nuclear option...Serrano, Cayenne and Thai Chili peppers. My sister likes to dry them, but I like to freeze them.


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

@Chris LI , haha, I also have jalapenos growing. Browns and Reds. Turned out little hotter than the pickled ones you buy in the supermarket so works perfect for me. I'll most likely go a little easier on the Scoville scale for next season. Probably will do Scotch Bonnet Yellows because they have a beautiful color and that distinct scotch bonnet flavor and balanced heat. A workmate gave me a couple of his "monkey face" to try and they had very good ballance between flavour and heat IMHO, so I'll probably plant a few of them next year.


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

Took the lawn down to 5/8" today and it looks amazing. The mower seems to cut soooooo much better at this height than at 3/4". Much better after cut appearance with much less straglers. Might be that the groomer is now set to 5mm, rather than 10?!?

More or less unrelated to lawn care, I've also picked up golf again. I used to be a pretty decent player but in 2012 we bought a house that needed a LOT of work and when the house was finished we where finally blessed with a baby (boy) and between that and demanding work, golf just had to be put on hold for another...five years(!).

Last month, however, I've started to bring the family to the local range and it looks like the little one is pretty much hooked (for now, at least!)...and that's why I don't have any pictures of the lawn....

The guy in front of my tee managed to produce an absolute one of a kind freak toe hit so bad it hit the divider pole bouncing *backwords* hitting my bag...in which I had stowed away my phone, which is now a shattered glass, plastics and magnesium paper weight with a deep indent about the size of a golf ball...

So, no pictures until tomorrow, at least...


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

OK, @Greasmatta, I've now done some research into what fungus problems are most common up here and how to prevent them. No surprise, pink snow mold (microdochium nivale) and gray snow mold (typhula incarnata) are by far the most common problems up here. In addition, dollar spot (Clarireedia homoeocarpa) has started to become a problem since it was first "imported" years ago and is now quite widespread.

There are a couple programs discussed on STERF, with preventive apps for pink snow mold of Fludioxonil and Propiconazol in the late fall. However, I found a really good article on preventive fungicide programs that target both grey and pink snow mold, but today I can't seem to find it on google!?! I'll do another try to find it in the next few days but basically there are three fungicides that you should try to get your hands on that will take care of pretty much any fungus problem in Nordic lawns. Best practice is to alternate between these to try to prevent resistance to develop:

Bumper 250 EC (Propiconazol 250 g / l) -Good effect on gray snow mold and pink snow mold
TAZER 250 SC	Azoxystrobin - 250 g / l ) -Good effect on pink snow mold and "dollar spot"
Geoxe 50 WG	Fludioxonil 500 g / kg) -Good effect on pink snow mold


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

OK, despite the improved after cut appearance with the lower HOC I decided to pull the trigger and order an 8 blade reel and all other parts needed to rebuild the Flex 21 into a groomerless, high-HOC version.

What has prevented me from doing this so far was the *insanely* expensive counterweight, basically a fist sized lump of cast iron that balances the cutting unit when the groomer drive unit is removed. It's about $50, which I probably could live with. Thing is that it is such an unusual spare part that they don't carry it at all in Europe, so they order it from the US and with shipping and handling they list it at $250!!!

Today when I started randomly surfing the internet out of utter boredom attended a very interesting and engaging conference call, there's this add popping up from a surplus with that counterweight priced at $60. Sometimes I just love that google tracks your every move...

So, I bought it, and then I ordered a 8-blade reel, a new low cut bedknife and a bunch of other stuff from R&R (a 8 blade reel over here is around $700, so while R&R still charges $80 bucks for the shipping, I still save a *lot* ordering it from the US).

Probably will wait until end of season before I tear down the Flex21 cutting unit, but at the same time I am really eager to see how the 8-blade setup compares...


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

It's getting colder. And darker. Fast. Decided to hold back a bit on the lawn care regimen this weekend and instead focus on family, the neighbors stellar late-summer pool-party and harvesting most of the ripe chilli from my two tiny mini-greenhouses.

The idea with the chili is to do a few batches of hot-sause out of them. I have grown some sweet Lombardo peppers for my 5yo that he wanted to ferment into a chili sauce so we're gonna do that. Then I have some lovely yellow scotch bonnets that I just got to do a pure yellow hot sauce out of (insane color and insane heat!) and then I have a *ridiculous* amount of chili from a plant seeded as a Carolina Reaper, but it does not actually look like it is a CR and it ripened a bit earlier than my other CR. It is *insanely* hot, though, so it might just be a wierd looking CR. Anyways, got that fermenting in the third jar...

Scotch Bonnet Chocolate are still ripening and I think I'll just freeze the ones I can harvest rather than make hot sauce out of them. The few Jallapenos that are still left, I will pickle them in a week or two -but I would be nice with some red and brown color in the jar, to complement the green.





So, what's next for the lawn? Well, dropped some more N tonight because we'll finally be getting some rain. Tempted to drop the HOC to 1/2" but I will probably wait until I have leveled the lawn (scheduled for spring 2021).


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## Chris LI (Oct 26, 2018)

:bandit:


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

Toro Flex 21 @ 5/8". Sweeeeet!


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## g-man (Jun 15, 2017)

Wow. Do you remember how it look early this season ?


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

g-man said:


> Wow. Do you remember how it look early this season ?


Hehe...yes @g-man I do...


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

TheSwede said:


> g-man said:
> 
> 
> > Wow. Do you remember how it look early this season ?
> ...


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## Babameca (Jul 29, 2019)

That's is incredible!!!


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

Babameca said:


> That's is incredible!!!


Thanks, @Babameca, it has been absolutely perfect conditions here the last few weeks and it looks absolutely amazing now. Get a lot of comments from my neighbors, referring to it as "unreal", "insane", or my favourite "if Ken and Barbie had a lawn, this is what it would look like". But, then again, I've put in a lot of work the last couple years to get it to this level.

Hopefully, I'll be able to do reno the back yard in 2021, but with Covid-19 causing uncertainty (my wife was laid off earlier this year, for reasons unrelated to covid) I'll just have to wait and see what the budget is for next year. That said, I'm trying to get my hands on a decent leaf blower (Stihl BR 600 or similar) and I also want a better trimmer -have one of the simpler Makita's now but I would like to get one of the multi-function trimmers so I can do both trimming and edging with different attachments. Contemplating to sell my other kidney and my retinas on the Russian black market :lol: ...


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## Babameca (Jul 29, 2019)

TheSwede said:


> Babameca said:
> 
> 
> > That's is incredible!!!
> ...


 :lol: :lol: :lol:


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## BBLOCK (Jun 8, 2020)

great transformation!


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

BBLOCK said:


> great transformation!


Thanks @BBLOCK!


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

Got the chilli sauce done today. Had a cooler malfunction so the fermentation temperature was all over the place the last few weeks but I think it turned out OK. The Scotch Bonnet Yellow looks and smells amazing and it is hot, but not insanely hot (for my taste). The red sauce, on the other hand, is what I can only decribe as "weapons grade" chilli sauce -made from pure Carolina Reaper and with a couple garlics added to deepen the taste. I am quite used to hot food and sauces, but this was something else! Tasted a teaspoon and didn't think much of it at first. Great taste, kind of sweet, and then the heat started to build. Gdamn, it was a lot of heat -uncontrolled sweating and tingling arms before it mellowed out! Will use that one with care, for sure:



When it comes to leaf blower I settled for a Makita 2x18V unit -they where on sale and since I have a lot of 18V makita tools in my arsenal I figured it would be the economically sound thing to invest in. If I'm not satisfied with the performance, I am only like $130 in the hole and can go for a backpack Stihl for next season.... Think I need to buy a couple new batteries, though, since the ones I have have been used a lot the last 7 years and while they worked great for the total reno of my house seven years ago, and still is OK for screwing a couple screws from now and then, this beast is eating my old batteries for breakfast! Makita DUB362Z:


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## Ware (Jan 28, 2017)

Great journal! And the lawn is looking great!


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

Thanks @Ware -the lawn would not be this good, had it not been for this forum!


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## Stuofsci02 (Sep 9, 2018)

Looks great. I would expect nothing less from a flex21.


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

Stuofsci02 said:


> Looks great. I would expect nothing less from a flex21.


Haha, I love my Flex21. Wife not so much!  But when it comes to lawn appearance, I also have a great advantage of having lower summer temperatures, longer days and generally the precipitation up here is more regular and controlled than what you US guys experience in general... However:








Daylight is disappearing fast now, 5 minutes per day right now, and temperatures are dropping fast. Main goal now is to prep the lawn for spring. Trying the Nitroblitz this year but with the temperatures and daylight conditions up here it also puts me in the snow mold window. I think I have planned a program that will work out for me but we'll see spring 2021. Maybe I'm laughing or maybe I'm back at square one...


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## Stuofsci02 (Sep 9, 2018)

@TheSwede ... did you do an 8 blade reel conversion? I am running an 11 with the HHOC kit. I am going to get the 8 blade this offseason tith the high cut bedknife. While they are at it I am going to change all the bearings etc so I'm ready for next season. It's going to cost me about 500 US but it should make the machine perfect for my needs.


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

Stuofsci02 said:


> @TheSwede ... did you do an 8 blade reel conversion? I am running an 11 with the HHOC kit. I am going to get the 8 blade this offseason tith the high cut bedknife. While they are at it I am going to change all the bearings etc so I'm ready for next season. It's going to cost me about 500 US but it should make the machine perfect for my needs.


I have the 8 blade reel and all the parts needed (i think!) to convert to 8 blade with high HOC kit (without groomer) in my possessionm so I´m planning to convert to 8 blade and possibly high HOC during this winter. Aiming for 1/2" next season so will probably shift between groomer and high HOC kit during the season depending on how it develops. I really like the grooomer though, so I´ll probably aim for 8 blade @ 1/2" with groomer and hope that the grass gods are good to me 2021....


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## Stuofsci02 (Sep 9, 2018)

TheSwede said:


> Stuofsci02 said:
> 
> 
> > @TheSwede ... did you do an 8 blade reel conversion? I am running an 11 with the HHOC kit. I am going to get the 8 blade this offseason tith the high cut bedknife. While they are at it I am going to change all the bearings etc so I'm ready for next season. It's going to cost me about 500 US but it should make the machine perfect for my needs.
> ...


Awesome! Amazing transformation BTW. I know coming out of spring it was looking a bit sketchy, but looks like your hard work really paid off.


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

Stuofsci02 said:


> Awesome! Amazing transformation BTW. I know coming out of spring it was looking a bit sketchy, but looks like your hard work really paid off.


Coming out of spring It looked like a friggin' train wreck IMHO! I thought that this will never sort itself out no matter how much work I put in... Fast forward to August and I have a lawn that I could not be more satisfied with. I actually almost can't believe it myself. And it really was not that much work...

But now everything is shifting from mowing @5/8" to preparing the lawn for next season. Temperatures are still decent (60-68F highs and 50F lows), but daylight is fading fast. Leafs are falling from the trees and humidity is close to 100% now so fungus starts to be a bit of a concern.


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

So growth is kind of slowing down, and with temperatures dropping fast and light rain is forecasted pretty much every other day, humidity is close to 100% and we're entering dollar spot and snow mold season. Up here fungicides are used in fall and beginning of winter. Summers are dry and low humidity, fall is the opposite...

I have done a preventive app of azoxy for dollar spot and gray snow mold, but the real problem up here is pink snow mold, but to battle microdochium nivale (pink snow mold), propriconazole is the go to fungicide in Europe. Turns out it is almost impossible to find a source offering this... After several nights of googling I think I might have found a source that can have it delivered in a week or two.

This is the state of the lawn today (a *lot* of worm castings creating bare spots when beeing run over by a 200+ pound mower ):


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

Lawn is officially dormant -applied a fungicide (fludioxinil) that will hopefully keep the lawn free from the problems I had last winter with snow mold.

With the lawn dormant and prepped for winter, I have rediscovered hockey! Have a 5yo that has pretty much been refusing all sports so far except golf (!). Wife signed him up for hockey and since I played at a pretty decent level until I was 15 (when I quit for no particular reason) I decided to get myself a pair of hockey skates to join him on the ice. While I have been skating a fair amount after I quit hockey, I have only skated tour skates the last 25+ years(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v3O9vNi-dkA)
and have not used hockey skates since 1995 so first hour was a bit wobbly. However, opening the door to the rink and putting down your left skate on the rink after 25 years of absence just stargated me back to my prime time moments with hockey and I just filled up with the absolute joy of gliding over the surface of the ice with my son. So apart from beeing a lawn nerd I am now also doubling as a hockey coach teaching kids to play hockey! Luckiest guy in the world!


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## TheSwede (Jul 10, 2018)

Swedish Glögg (Glühwein on steroids):
Ingredients:
1 bottle of vodka (1 EU "bottle" is around 24 floz)
25 grams of cinnamon (whole if available)
10 grams of cardemom seeds (whole if available)
10 grams of carnation (whole if available)
300 grams of white sugar
150 cl of water
1 bottle of decent red wine
1 bottle of Vintry's Taverna, or similar sweet and strong apertif or desert wine preferably with aroma including rasin, plums and cinamon. A sweeter sherry might be a good substitute...

Preparation:
1. grind the spices using a mortar. Don´t be too meticulous -it should not be pulverised, just broken up a bit.
2. pour the vodka into a jar and add the spices, put on a lid and let it rest for at least 3 days.
3. add water and white sugar into an empty pan and heat until dissolved to make a sugar syrup.
4. sifth the vodka and spice solution off into a suitably large pan and add the bottle of red wine and the bottle of Taverna.
5. heat the pan until warm (aim for your sweet spot hot chocolate temperature)
5. add the sugar syrup produced in step 3 to the pan to your taste (I like it a little dry, but if you want to go discustingly sweet, you're still in the target window here...).

Serve hot in small glasses with a teaspoon or two of peeled almonds and rasins. Cinamon sticks and slices of orage (with peel) can be used to enhance the appearance and flavour.

Enjoy.


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