# Dangerlawn journal



## Dangerlawn (Sep 13, 2018)

This used to be the front yard



The two trees had to go



Installed drip irrigation on 7/27/2019 using Netafim Techline CV with 0.26 GPH emitters spaced 18 inches apart.





Sand capped with two yards of masonry sand to fill the trenches



The Bermuda started to grow back in about a week





Not perfect but it's better than no irrigation at all. Next season I will be trying to get rid of the #dripstripes


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## Dangerlawn (Sep 13, 2018)

The backyard started like this



Removed the stump and then had to replace all the main lines



Killed everything off last season



Got rid of the other tree and killed the lawn again this spring



Seeded La Prima Bermuda on 5/17/2019



Fought weeds and established the new lawn


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## Dangerlawn (Sep 13, 2018)

Had our first freeze of the year today. Yard is looking rough.


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## Dangerlawn (Sep 13, 2018)

Looks like dormancy is coming soon and the lawn is switching to carbohydrate storage.

The newly seeded Bermuda is losing color faster than the celebration.



Planning to apply indaziflam around Halloween.


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## Bmossin (May 31, 2018)

Cool...the drip irrigation seems pretty cool. I think probably the first time I have seen that on here.


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## Dangerlawn (Sep 13, 2018)

Bmossin said:


> Cool...the drip irrigation seems pretty cool. I think probably the first time I have seen that on here.


Thanks. I had fun installing it and should be learning a lot next spring. I think if I can keep the color consistent at a lower mowing height I'll be really happy with it.

11-1-2019

Bermuda is mostly dormant but still have some broadleaf, wild onion, sedge and fescue. I did an app of prodiamine about a month ago but wanted to go strong on poa this year, so I did this app today:

4 gallons water
5 mil Esplanade (indaziflam)
A bit over 1 gram envoke (monument) 
4 Tbs surfactant

Applied this using a chapin 4 gal backpack to around 4,000 square feet and then did the same mix again to the remaining 4,000.

I walked pretty fast and did a double pass because I wasn't using marker dye.

Temperature in the 50s with lots of sun.

I hope to see results this winter!

Once it goes completely dormant I will paint at least 2,000 of it green.


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## Dangerlawn (Sep 13, 2018)

11-3-2019

Lightly watered in the indaziflam app and now I'm debating whether or not it's time to paint it green for the winter. It has completely stopped growing but still has green color in spots.


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## Dangerlawn (Sep 13, 2018)

11-4-2019

Painted the lawn today with a gallon of Green Lawnger. Pretty expensive at $75 per 1,000.... I'm debating buying another gallon or two to finish the job.

Before:



After


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## Ware (Jan 28, 2017)

Looks good!


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## Thor865 (Mar 26, 2018)

Dangerlawn said:


> 11-4-2019
> 
> Painted the lawn today with a gallon of Green Lawnger. Pretty expensive at $75 per 1,000.... I'm debating buying another gallon or two to finish the job.
> 
> ...


Looks great. But your missing out on the sissy grass stripes


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## Dangerlawn (Sep 13, 2018)

Thor865 said:


> Dangerlawn said:
> 
> 
> > 11-4-2019
> ...


That is true... Or if I had a "real" reel mower instead of this manual one, I could do cheater stripes like the lawn tools.


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## stogie1020 (Sep 10, 2019)

Wow, the buried drip looks cool! Any issues with minerals in the water clogging the emitters over time?


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## Dangerlawn (Sep 13, 2018)

stogie1020 said:


> Wow, the buried drip looks cool! Any issues with minerals in the water clogging the emitters over time?


Hopefully not. My dad has had the same netafim in his flower beds for 11 years without problems. I'm hoping to have similar luck.


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## stogie1020 (Sep 10, 2019)

OK, good to hear.

I have used the basic soaker tubes, both above and below ground, and our hard water always ends up clogging them up totally in a few months...


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## Dangerlawn (Sep 13, 2018)

11-8-2019

Finished painting the lawn. I wish I had bought more paint because I missed a few spots. I also got sloppy and painted the cement several times.

Overall I think it's ok, but I don't know that I would do it again. I would certainly try a different product next time.


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## Dangerlawn (Sep 13, 2018)

I officially hate the way the lawn looks right now. After a few rains and some time, the color has changed and just looks completely unnatural and bad to me. I do not recommend using Green Lawnger to paint a dormant Bermuda lawn.


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## Dangerlawn (Sep 13, 2018)

This is a current picture but it's hard to judge off this. In person it looks really bad. It's not fooling anyone.


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## Thor865 (Mar 26, 2018)

Dangerlawn said:


> This is a current picture but it's hard to judge off this. In person it looks really bad. It's not fooling anyone.


I see a PRG overseed in your future plans of fall 2020


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## Dangerlawn (Sep 13, 2018)

Thor865 said:


> Dangerlawn said:
> 
> 
> > This is a current picture but it's hard to judge off this. In person it looks really bad. It's not fooling anyone.
> ...


Yes absolutely! Can't wait to try that next!

12/5/2019

Did some leaf cleanup today. Raked and blew everything into a pile and spread it across the lawn, and then mulch mowed in four directions.



The lawn paint is holding up but still looks awful to me. I wish I never did it.

Edit: actually, looking at the pictures I can see it's faded more than I realized. In one month it's noticeably lighter.


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## mowww (Jan 16, 2018)

Dangerlawn said:


> Thor865 said:
> 
> 
> > Dangerlawn said:
> ...


The paint looks pretty good to me. How are you liking your Earthwise 7-blade reel? Looks smooth from your photos, do you have to double cut? Any sharpening since you bought it?


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## Dangerlawn (Sep 13, 2018)

mowww said:


> The paint looks pretty good to me. How are you liking your Earthwise 7-blade reel? Looks smooth from your photos, do you have to double cut? Any sharpening since you bought it?


I love the earthwise when I cut at 1 inch, but it leaves really bad washboarding marks if I cut any lower.

Like this:



Also it's a pain to adjust the cutting height because you have to take off the wheels. I'm just leaving at an inch and not touching it.

I do not have to double cut and I haven't sharpened it yet. After a full season it still cuts paper across the entire bed knife and does a better job than my toro rotary at leaving a smooth surface.

If it broke tomorrow I would buy the same one again.

I maintain it by blowing it off with an air compressor after every use and then putting some WD-40 all over the metal parts. I used it daily for a long time


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## mowww (Jan 16, 2018)

@Dangerlawn thank you for the thorough reply! For my next project I'd like to utilize this mower. I appreciate the information.


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## Dangerlawn (Sep 13, 2018)

The pre emergents are working fantastic.

Last year without pre em I was covered in poa:



This year, zero.


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## Dangerlawn (Sep 13, 2018)

Found a couple weeds in the yard today, mostly in the alley. Sprayed them all with some ready to spray stuff I had laying around, so I will see how well this works.. didn't feel like mixing up anything since it's just a few plants



Common mallow:



Poa:



Not sure what the rest are


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## Dangerlawn (Sep 13, 2018)

Zero difference on any of the weeds I sprayed. It being an amine during weather seems to be the issue. I'll just pull them by hand if they don't die in a couple weeks, or I might respray a few times and see what happens.


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## Dangerlawn (Sep 13, 2018)

Decided to remove the little fence in the backyard. Bought a farm jack, some chain and a few half inch bolts to remove the posts.



Will be buying a John Deere 260SL very soon and wanted to get the yard ready for reel mowing. Less obstacles to mow and edge around. We really don't need the fence because the dog just jumps over it anyway and it's secured with a gate.


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## Dangerlawn (Sep 13, 2018)

Fence posts are gone and I put out a yard of top soil to fill the holes. This will get sanded in Spring before I start reel mowing it.


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## Dangerlawn (Sep 13, 2018)

I found my reel mower! It's a Toro Greensmaster 1000 that I picked up for $750. We woke up at 5am to drive out to McKinney Texas and pick it up. We didn't get home until around 6pm.

Despite the long drive, I'm very happy with it. It wasn't cutting paper at first but I was able to adjust that and get it cutting paper across the whole bed knife.

Cut the yard today at around 3/4 inch. It looks like crap but it's not the mowers fault. It's from the lawn paint job and my lack of experience.









Next step is to clean it up real nice and learn how to do the grease fittings, change oil/filter/spark plug etc.


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## Redtwin (Feb 9, 2019)

You're going to LOVE that mower! It took me a bit to learn to control it but it cuts great. I nicknamed mine the "Spooked Mule". It'll pop wheelies until you learn to work the drive lever smoothly.

Sounds like you got a great deal!!!


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## jabopy (Nov 24, 2018)

Great mower :thumbup: now you have a better run with the tree gone and now the fence out of the way. Love the geen :mrgreen:


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## Dangerlawn (Sep 13, 2018)

I do love this mower! I just put down some stripes in the dormant Bermuda.



I feel like I'm starting to get the hang of using it. I popped a ton of wheelies in the process, but I found a good throttle speed I like. I might take off the transport connections to get in closer with the mower against obstacles. Otherwise I'm pretty happy with everything so far.

Had an issue with the throttle cable. It fell out of position inside the control panel and made me think the cable died. I popped it back and now I'm good to go. I went ahead and ordered all new cables for the controls, but I really didn't need to. This is just for piece of mind and to have a small project replacing them. I paid about $150 for the three OEM cables. The cable housings are all busted open and worn so if nothing else they'll look better.


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## Dangerlawn (Sep 13, 2018)

Put out the last of my air 8 bottle today in the backyard. It was probably only around 16 oz or so. I applied it with the simple lawn solutions sprayer across around 4,000 square foot. It's supposed to rain today to help it get into the soil.


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## Mopar69 (Jun 12, 2019)

Just looked over your journal. Wow, lots of work in half a year. I've had drip irrigation in my beds for years...have never really used it, I have 5 children (I'm a milk man - insert joke) that I keep busy hand watering. Seems really cool to have in a yard.


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## Dangerlawn (Sep 13, 2018)

Mopar69 said:


> Just looked over your journal. Wow, lots of work in half a year. I've had drip irrigation in my beds for years...have never really used it, I have 5 children (I'm a milk man - insert joke) that I keep busy hand watering. Seems really cool to have in a yard.


Thanks, I like to stay busy. I really enjoy the hand watering as well. The drip should come in handy for vacation and droughts.

1/25/2020

Today I mowed the back yard at 0.5 inch

Still playing with the new mower and learning how it works. So far I've greased all the fittings with Lucas Marine grease and replaced the throttle and clutch cables. I still need to replace spark plug, change the oil, and clean fuel filter.

It's so nice seeing stripes in my dormant grass. I still need to work on making them straight. Lot of leveling to do as well.


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## Dangerlawn (Sep 13, 2018)

Mowed the dormant grass at 0.25 inches. It's crazy how many clippings were created going from 0.5 to 0.25 inch hoc. The clippings left small lines in the yard but it seems to be cutting really well.

Changed the oil and got it starting cold on first pull at half choke and mid throttle.

Using a mightyvac fluid extractor off Amazon for around $25 to remove the old oil and fill with 0.6 quarts of 10w30.


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## Ware (Jan 28, 2017)

Dangerlawn said:


> ...It's crazy how many clippings were created going from 0.5 to 0.25 inch hoc.


Agree - it always surprises me.


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## Dangerlawn (Sep 13, 2018)

3/1

It's summer weeds pre emergent day! I'm a little early but we have had two 70 degree days in a row with 24 hour soil temps are at 52.

Did a 6 month rate of prodiamine on the front yard and a 3 month rate on the backyard, which still needs to fill in so I'm splitting those apps to make sure I don't overdose anything. Eventually I'll have the full yearly max across everything and then switch back to indaziflam for fall.

I'll hit them again in about 30 days.

In the same tank I put down some humic 12 at the 6oz rate.

I also dusted off the drip irrigation and fixed a few things and created a new zone. It seems to be working fine, but I'll be dragging a hose to water in the pre.

We're not done freezing yet so I'm not bringing out any hose timers quite yet.


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## Dangerlawn (Sep 13, 2018)

3/11/2020

Did an xsoil app on the front and back yard at 10lbs per M rate. So the entire bag covered about 4,500 sq ft. It's been a few days since I did this app and it rained twice since.

Scalped the lawn down to 0.2 inches and bagged clippings on first pass and then stopped collecting for the remaining passes. I probably wasted some of my xsoil prills, but that's fine. I wanted to scalp so I scalped.



This was a pretty difficult process because I was going from .75 to 0.2 inches. I should have probably not done that much at once. It was really difficult to push the mower and I had to raise it pretty often to get the mower to move. I might have damaged my belts some in the process but it still works for now.

I noticed it went from cutting paper before mowing to not cutting after. I will readjust but it's probably telling me I pushed the limits of what the reel can handle. I definitely hit more sticks and stuff that I wanted to.

I do not have a single weed in the yard thanks to indaziflam in October.

The Bermuda is just barely trying to wake up.

This scalp was too early but I couldn't help myself. I'll do it again at 0.1 inches soon.


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## Dangerlawn (Sep 13, 2018)

3/24

Dissolved a 6 oz Tournament Ready pellet in a gallon of water and applied 8oz per M to my front and back yard with a sprayer and the red AI teejet nozzle. Watered it in real well after. I'm hoping this will get the water flowing better with my drip irrigation and avoid the green lines that developed last season.

This is how I'm looking right now. HOC is 0.4 inches


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## Dangerlawn (Sep 13, 2018)

Officially giving up on the turf drip as of today. I just can't handle the spotted appearance and green lines. If I could do it again I would have picked the 0.9 GPH instead of 0.26 GPH and I would not have used propane to warm the tubes before connecting (they tend to leak easier when you do this)

I'm back to dragging hoses with the MP rotators... but at least I know the water coverage will be good. I'm only really focused on 4,700 square foot at the moment, so it shouldn't be too bad. If it becomes unmanageable I'll have to look into "real" irrigation.

I'll still be using drip to water my flowers, shrubs and the long driveway strip of turf which is about 3 foot by 200 foot.


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## Dangerlawn (Sep 13, 2018)

Yesterday was a big scalp day on the backyard. I used my greensworks dethatcher and then ran over everything with with the rotary on the lowest setting several times. I pulled out a ton of dead material, way more than expected. I can really see the dirt now. Still no fert because it's not warm enough.

Today I did a 6 month rate of prodiamine on the same area (1 oz total for 2,700 square foot) with a bit less on the areas that need to fill in after the fence removal. Watered it all in using my mp rotators connected with a hose.

Before and after scalping


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## Dangerlawn (Sep 13, 2018)

My liquid peptides shows up yesterday from subvertnpk.com

I applied this morning to my front yard (0.5 oz per M) along with some Greene effect 7-0-0 (6 oz per M) and Microgreene 0-0-2 (6oz per M)

Used the red XR teejet nozzle since it's a foliar app. Did two passes in different directions... worked out really well

I'm hoping this will get rid of the chlorosis I have


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## Dangerlawn (Sep 13, 2018)

We had ourselves a bit of a late freeze and snow this past weekend



This week the temps are warming up and hopefully staying that way.

I'm not full on fertilizing yet but I did spray a little today

Front yard (rates per M)
O.75 oz depth 10+ peptides 
8 oz Greene effect 
6 oz microgreene

Backyard (2.7 M)
2.5 oz depth 10+ peptides (going heavy)
8 oz Greene effect

We'll see how this works. The front looks fairly green and nice but the backyard is struggling. The la Prima I seeded last year is coming up real slow and thin and yellow. Everything is scalped and dethatched. Just need warmer weather...


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## Dangerlawn (Sep 13, 2018)

This week I fertilized the front and back with 13-13-13 at a half pound N per M rate. I'm saving my xgrn for later...

I also did an app of subvert depth 10+ on the front and back. The front was light and the back was a full dose around 3oz per M

I need to keep better notes of what I'm doing....


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## Dangerlawn (Sep 13, 2018)

Things are greening up nicely with the subvert depth 10+and xgrn 8-1-8. My neighbors yard looks amazing too (the one in the top right with the handicap ramp) and all they've had this year is prodiamine, a touch of humic 12, a pound of N per M through 13-13-13 and maybe two waterings.

We haven't had a significant rain in months so I'm really surprised how well everything looks. I've been mowing the neighbor lawn about every 3 days at an inch with the earthwise 7 blade and mine every day or two at 0.4 inches with the GM1000.





This spot here (middle strip surrounded by concrete) is getting liquid only fert this season. I'm using Peters professional all purpose 20-20-20 with chelated micros. It's only had 0.4 pounds N so far this year. The pic below is before the first app. Looks nice and green without any fert so far.


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## Mopar69 (Jun 12, 2019)

A while back you said you were having to take your GM to D/FW area for service. I told you I'd ask around the Lubbock area. There's a gentleman named Scott who does onsite reel work. You can contact him @ 806-773-3643.


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## Dangerlawn (Sep 13, 2018)

Mopar69 said:


> A while back you said you were having to take your GM to D/FW area for service. I told you I'd ask around the Lubbock area. There's a gentleman named Scott who does onsite reel work. You can contact him @ 806-773-3643.


Awesome thank you @Mopar69


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## Dangerlawn (Sep 13, 2018)

Here is what the lawn looking like today







The products I'm using lately are Tnex, 8-1-8, depth 10+, tournament ready, feature, Peters 20-20-20 all purpose.


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