# ABC123 Nomix spring sodding with the intention of sub 1in Hoc



## ABC123 (Jul 14, 2017)

​I'd figure I could make this a new thread for my upcoming lawn.

After reading through this thread with so much information. http://thelawnforum.com/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=388 
I'm kinda stumped on the correct way I should go about this.

The builder won't budge from the sod or sod company. The timeframe is may/June close date and that's getting close to summer here in the twin cities.

Problems I'm seeing is I can only water even or odd days unless I get a 30 day permit from the city.

I've already purchased a greens mower from Pete and super excited to use it but I'm unsure about how aggressive I can be with new sod.

Best sod practices I've found is mow after 2-3 weeks at 2.5in so the sod has a chance to attach.

If I were to get a 30 day permit at sod down could I cut it at 1in after the 2 weeks and then I'd have 2 weeks to get some PRG down and germinated? Or would overseeding after sodding be a horrible idea?

Another option would be wait the 3 weeks and cut the sod at 1in and see how it goes through the summer and overseed in the fall.

Or am I taking this too short too fast and I should cut with a rotary and start at 2.5 for a few months till the yard settles and focus this more on a late summer goal?

Total lot area is 13,270sq ft and the lawn area of 8300sq ft, I'll get a soil sample done as quick as possible.


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## g-man (Jun 15, 2017)

With that timeframe, I would ask for a credit for the money they will spend on the sod. Get the house in bare dirt. Do an irrigation install and start from good quality seed in late July.

When sod is harvested it goes thru some stress. Cutting it to 1in from 2.5 will be adding more stress. I would not do it that fast or going into summer. I would mow with the rotary until August.


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## ABC123 (Jul 14, 2017)

It has to have a lawn before we can get approval for occupancy. If I could do a credit I would.

We will have an irrigation installed so would the cutting short stress be less minimal on the sod after it attaches?


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## ABC123 (Jul 14, 2017)

Here's a blueprint for the lot.


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## osuturfman (Aug 12, 2017)

Which sod farm?


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## g-man (Jun 15, 2017)

ABC123 said:


> It has to have a lawn before we can get approval for occupancy. If I could do a credit I would.
> 
> We will have an irrigation installed so would the cutting short stress be less minimal on the sod after it attaches?


Our city allows occupancy prior to seed if over winter or with a solid rational (irrigation install). They don't requiere sod, but it needs to have seeds to control erosion. Our builders only install sod in the front and seeds on the sides and back. You could get sod for the side and back at a premium.


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## ABC123 (Jul 14, 2017)

osuturfman said:


> Which sod farm?


https://m.yellowpages.com/elk-river-mn/mip/kowsary-turf-inc-3944578


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## Pete1313 (May 3, 2017)

I wouldn't dismiss the sod as a good option for what you want to do... at least not yet. Sports fields use sod and then reel mow it without issues. Like osuturfman said, start asking questions now. Who is the sod farm? Contact them and ask what cultivars and varieties they use? Let us know what they say. You could rotory mow the sod for the first couple mows at 2-2.5" and then drop it down to 1.5" mid august with the rotory and start reel mowing at 1 1/16"(max HOC with roller in the close position) shortly after. You will have alot to do with a new home and the move so maybe managing close mowed turf would be better suited for late summer once you are settled. I would not overseed with PRG, at least not plan on it until you find out just what kind of sod you are dealing with. PRG is beautiful, but KBG would be a better fit for your winters and the sod will have KBG in it. Just depends on how well the cultivars can handle close mowing. Make sure they do a good install with the sod and everything is smooth and tight, and that will help you down the road when reel mowing.

Btw, congrats on the mower. I can't wait to see it in action! :thumbsup:


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## g-man (Jun 15, 2017)

The following comment has nothing to do with lawn. One of the main problems with a new house with basement is the amount of settling that happens to the graded soil. Seeing the elevation in your layout, I would be concerned with a negative grade (waters runs towards the basement wall). In my house I had around 8-12in drop in height of the soil around the perimeter of the house two years post construction. My house elevation was picked 3-4 feet higher than the lot and the lot is 3 feet higher than the street. I ended up adding more soil to keep the grading away from the house.


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## ABC123 (Jul 14, 2017)

Pete1313 said:


> I wouldn't dismiss the sod as a good option for what you want to do... at least not yet. Sports fields use sod and then reel mow it without issues. Like osuturfman said, start asking questions now. Who is the sod farm? Contact them and ask what cultivars and varieties they use? Let us know what they say. You could rotory mow the sod for the first couple mows at 2-2.5" and then drop it down to 1.5" mid august with the rotory and start reel mowing at 1 1/16"(max HOC with roller in the close position) shortly after. You will have alot to do with a new home and the move so maybe managing close mowed turf would be better suited for late summer once you are settled. I would not overseed with PRG, at least not plan on it until you find out just what kind of sod you are dealing with. PRG is beautiful, but KBG would be a better fit for your winters and the sod will have KBG in it. Just depends on how well the cultivars can handle close mowing. Make sure they do a good install with the sod and everything is smooth and tight, and that will help you down the road when reel mowing.
> 
> Btw, congrats on the mower. I can't wait to see it in action! :thumbsup:


Alright, I completely agree low mow turf might be a little bit much right at move in.

I'm thinking prg overseed because I'm not sure how well the sod grasses will handle the low cutting. Or is it below an inch is where most grass quality can suffer?


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## Pete1313 (May 3, 2017)

ABC123 said:


> Alright, I completely agree low mow turf might be a little bit much right at move in.
> 
> I'm thinking prg overseed because I'm not sure how well the sod grasses will handle the low cutting. Or is it below an inch is where most grass quality can suffer?


At what HOC a certain KBG cultivar will start to decline? I don't know as my only experience is with Bewitched, which has looked good at 9/16". I would think that 1" is a very safe HOC however.
There are 110 different cultivars that were evaluated in the NTEP 2006-2010 report. Mean turfgrass quality maintained using "Schedule A" is a set of data that evaluates all those cultivars when they were mowed between .4"-.6" HOC and 3-4 lbs of N/M were applied. They all had a mean ranging from 6.9-3.5. Bewitched was in the middle at 6.1. Point is, all those KBG cultivars were mowed extremely short, some of them performed better than others, but all of them survived the low HOC for 5 years.

NTEP 06-10 Final Report-Mean Quality "Schedule A"


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## ABC123 (Jul 14, 2017)

Very interesting. That gives me hope, thank you Pete for the great information.


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## Pete1313 (May 3, 2017)

ABC123 said:


> Very interesting. That gives me hope, thank you Pete for the great information.


No problem. I would call the turf farm and see what cultivars they use. Let us know what they say.


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## ken-n-nancy (Jul 25, 2017)

ABC123 said:


> Problems I'm seeing is I can only water even or odd days unless I get a 30 day permit from the city.


You should plan on getting the 30-day permit for the first 30 days after installation.

However, with even/odd watering -- you can still essentially water every day by setting your irrigation timer appropriately.

For initial every-day watering for new sod (or new grass after it has germinated), let's say that you're an "odd house" (and can thus only water on odd days), and that it takes 2 hours for you to water your newly-sodded area. So, set your timer to not water on even days, but to water twice on "odd days" as follows:
* start watering 3am (to be done by 5am) -- this will water the lawn in advance of the "odd day"
* start watering at 9:45pm (to be done by 11:45pm) -- this will water the lawn at the end of the "odd day" (essentially in advance of the even day)

With the above, you only water the lawn on odd days, which obeys the watering restriction. However, you also water the lawn before every hot-and-dry daytime period.

With 13ksqft, it may take you significantly longer than 2 hours to apply enough water, but that's just a matter of adjusting the times to make it work out.

The only downside is that 9:45pm is an earlier-than-desired time to start watering, as the lawn remains wet longer and can encourage fungus growth in hot, humid summers, but, in all honesty, if it's real hot and humid, you'll be getting dew on the line by 9:45pm anyway...


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## osuturfman (Aug 12, 2017)

Could always do an annual ryegrass seeding, pass your final inspection, then nuke it and establish whatever you want in late summer.


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## FuzzeWuzze (Aug 25, 2017)

Maybe im missing something, but if the entire lot is 13ksqft, as that drawing shows, plus that big house+driveway is being put on it in the configuration it is...how exactly do you still have anywhere near 13sqft of grass? Based on scaling in that drawing i'd think more like 6-7k of actual lawn? Not even counting mulch beds and other non lawn landscaped that will likely encompass the house itself.

I mean i have a ~8k Sqft lot and only ~2500 of it is actual grass.


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## ABC123 (Jul 14, 2017)

FuzzeWuzze said:


> Maybe im missing something, but if the entire lot is 13ksqft, as that drawing shows, plus that big house+driveway is being put on it in the configuration it is...how exactly do you still have anywhere near 13sqft of grass? Based on scaling in that drawing i'd think more like 6-7k of actual lawn? Not even counting mulch beds and other non lawn landscaped that will likely encompass the house itself.
> 
> I mean i have a ~8k Sqft lot and only ~2500 of it is actual grass.


Thank you for that. I just did more measurements and came up with 12,299k. So the lot is 12.2k minus the House, driveway and sidewalk should be about 8300sq ft of lawn. Makes me believe this is much more realistic being that it's smaller than I thought now.


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## g-man (Jun 15, 2017)

Also subtract the mulching beds (the ones done by the builder plus the ones you will add in the near future).


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## ABC123 (Jul 14, 2017)

Pete1313 said:


> I would call the turf farm and see what cultivars they use. Let us know what they say.


I'll give them a call, been crazy this week with work.

Been trying to find any study's about growth regulator and sodding and the only info I'm finding is using it before harvest to aid with stress/heat during and after transplant.

https://mafiadoc.com/plant-growth-regulators-can-enhance-the-recovery-of-kentucky-_59faf9e21723ddc43fc8ef6c.html

Trying to see if it would be beneficial to apply it at sod down to focus more on root growth. Or would this be more in the stress category on when to not apply it?

I'm open for any and all suggestions, can't thank everybody enough with how detailed and well thought out answers I've received.


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## Pete1313 (May 3, 2017)

Primo could help with rooting, but I'm not sure I would use it to start. The sod would be put down in end of May/early June. I would just take it easy and let it establish without much more then watering and light doses of nitrogen. The primo could help but would be a risk if you should develop any foliar disease. It would take longer to grow out of it when under primo regulation. I would keep cutting it on the short end with a rotory ~2" and then mid August(depending on weather) work it down to 1" with the reel and start on primo apps then.


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## ABC123 (Jul 14, 2017)

well no more sod, can't wait!!


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## Pete1313 (May 3, 2017)

Hey.. I have a bag that looks like that! Congrats on winning the battle with the builder! IIRC you were leaning towards a different cultivar. I'm happy you chose bewitched. How come the change?


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## ABC123 (Jul 14, 2017)

Pete1313 said:


> Hey.. I have a bag that looks like that! Congrats on winning the battle with the builder! IIRC you were leaning towards a different cultivar. I'm happy you chose bewitched. How come the change?


Yeah it was suposto be here on Saturday, kept getting delayed. I was going with midnight but I found a study that shows bewitched scored much better in my area than midnight. http://www.turf.umn.edu/sites/g/files/pua2626/f/media/2014_kentucky_bluegrass_ctbt_2016_data_updated_0.pdf?_ga=2.42539302.2077578799.1518669865-1768699422.1491025392


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## J_nick (Jan 28, 2017)

What I think of every time I read Bewitched


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