What should I do with my St.Augustine lawn?

Question

I have inherited some real estate last October. The land was vacant for over 10 months and by the time I got it the lawn was is a horrible condition. The St. Augustine Grass was infested with just about every problem one can find on the books: ants, weeds, chinch bug, gribs and thatch.

I have no experience but I am a fast learner and I would like to improve the lawn by myself. I have make couple of mistakes, by cutting the grass very short (1 inch) couple of weeks ago (now I have what appears to be brown dead circles on the lawn.

I would like to know if one has a calendar of what type of products to use, when is the best time to use the product. . . Something like a St. Augustine bible for Texas area.

Answer 1

St Augustine grass is actually a grassy vine. Once you kill it, its gone. Once it gets ugly it takes a lot of time to grow back. It MUST be well watered at all times or it will die back. Depending on how bad this lawn is, it may be better to till the whole thing under and re-sod. Keep it watered, and never cut it short, always leave the blades about 4 inches long or better. You can put down a turf builder with weed control but make sure its the pink pellets made especially for St Augustine or the grass will go yellow. Insects are not a problem. Unless you have fresh sod, you can put down any insect product such as diazanon.

Answer 2

Scott's makes great products for lawns for pest and weed control. Their website is really helpful too: http://www.scotts.com/

We live in Florida and have St. Augustine grass too and use Scott's Weed & Feed every spring to help control the weeds. We've tried other brands and they never work as well.

You can buy a thatching rake at any home improvement store like Lowe's or Home Depot and use it to help break up the thatch.

Don't expect immediate results. It can take a few years to get a lawn that's been neglected back into good shape.

Good luck.