Week in Review

[kate_nepveu]

Spring! The trees haven't leafed out yet, but it was 60-ish this weekend and we got a lot of yard work done. The everyellow and the spiky red triffid in front have been replaced by a dwarf burning bush (looking more like a stick at the moment, hopefully it grows fast) and some white Mediterranean heather. In the back, we put down grass seed again on the side (we're giving up on the back until the fall), this time with biodegradable protective matting. It would be really nice if this worked. I also set up our Christmas present from my folks, a gadget to trap biting insects. The placement may need fine-tuning, as something took a good chunk out of my neck this afternoon while I was reading the latest Dortmunder, but it's definitely catching some insects (you can see them caught on the sticky paper. Take that, bugs!).

The doggie was very pleased to be outside so much this weekend. She even hung out in the front yard with Chad (tied on a long leash to a tree), which she usually doesn't get to do because it's not fenced. If only she wouldn't insist on eating clumps of topsoil . . .

I also got my hair cut yesterday, hooray. The bad cut had gotten positively unbearable, so I walked into the first place I came to on upper Union Street on the theory that as long as it was shorter, it would be an improvement. I think I like this cut, but I have to live with it a bit; it's much more shaped, with the very bottom considerably thinner than usual. We also had dinner out last night, a Mexican place in downtown Albany, which was nice though I ate far too much.

I even got some reading done this weekend, though the book log won't be updated tonight because I have Work. It's going to be a bad couple of weeks for Work, alas, so I really ought to go check on the laundry and then get to it.

Comments

[montoya.livejournal.com]

The landscaping guy who was just out looking at our place says that planting grass in the spring isn't really feasible, as the weeds 'n' birds will beat it out, and that if you want to plant grass, you need to do it in the fall. I have no idea if this is true, but it sounds vaguely plausible.

[kate_nepveu]

It's _best_ to do it in the fall. However, a wide swath of our yard is currently dirt, so anything that actually takes would be an improvement.

[orzelc.livejournal.com]

They say that, but then our next-door neighbor says that she's never managed to plant anything in the fall and have it survive the birds and squirrels and erratic weather. The seeds I put down in the fall haven't really done spectacularly well, either. I think we're just screwed no matter what...

For the record, I did manage to plant some grass last spring and get it to grow, so it's not completely impossible. I hope that the netting will help somewhat with the birds, as well as with the "all the soil gets washed into the neighbors' yard" problem.

[montoya.livejournal.com]

See, and that's what I would have thought too -- that planting in the fall would be about the dumbest thing in the world to do, because it'd die during the winter.

I half suspect this guy is just trying to sell us (more lucrative) sod rather than (cheaper) hydroseeding, but my suspicion isn't exactly strong enough to risk a lawn full of mud all summer. I suppose we'll see what the other landscaping people say...

[kate_nepveu]

Sod is a very bad idea according to our landscaping guy.

The thing with fall is you do it early fall, after the worst of the heat (which kills grass), but hopefully early enough to get it established before the freeze. Winter doesn't kill established grass after all, otherwise we'd have to re-seed every winter.

[papersky.livejournal.com]

Why do you want grass at all? It's so obviously not suited to the climate I don't know why people bother. It's suitable for Britain, but wouldn't it make sense here to grow something like clover that covers the ground and you can walk on and which doesn't die or need a ton of watering in extreme heat?

I was thinking last summer that people here seem to want the idea of a lawn so much they go to all this trouble and I don't understand it.

[kate_nepveu]

I don't agree that it's not suitable for the climate--we didn't do anything to our front yard last summer (I'm pretty sure we didn't even water it) and it was fine. As I understand it, it's new grass that's particularly vulnerable to the heat. We've already got grass over most of the backyard, it's just patchy so we want to get more of it to improve the drainage and reduce the amount of mud the dog tracks in.

[montoya.livejournal.com]

It actually takes some amazing skill to kill grass. You need to do something really dumb, like cut it extra short (because you're sick of mowing so often) right in the middle of a long hot dry spell, and then utterly fail to water it at all for weeks.

[montoya.livejournal.com]

So why is sod bad? I mean, it's obviously expensive, but other than that, what's wrong with it?

(Getting estimates that include sod, and am suddenly all worried about it, based on the third-hand report from your landscaping guy.)

[kate_nepveu]

Apparently there is a thing called thatch, which is bad for lawns, which sod is much more prone to: I get the impression that it's tangled-matted stuff that blocks water from getting to the roots, and sod is kind of insta-thatch by its nature, so getting the grass to root into the soil below the sod is tricky. My lawn guy said he'd worked on lots of lawns where they did the front in sod and the back in seed and the back was much healthier.

OTOH, he did say that if we hit the lottery and wanted to pay someone to dig up the entire yard and put down sod, well, hey, it's your money.

However, when I heard that we couldn't just lay sod down on the little paths the dog has worn in the yard, but would have to dig up those areas and fit the sod in, my interest dropped to zero immediately, as you can tell by the less-than-clear explanation here.

[montoya.livejournal.com]

As I understand it (from reading around on the Web):

1. When they cut sod, they cut the root systems off, so as not to have a bighuge pile of dirt to carry around with them.

2. Which means that reestablishing the root system is key. This can be complicated by the soil-joining layer, if the soils are radically different or not placed well.

3. Thatch is the roots coming up near the surface to get water, because they aren't established deeply. (I think.)

4. Proper watering of sodded lawns is essential, and failing to do that will kill the sod, and dude.

5. Also, they recommend planting cool-season grasses (rye, fescue, Kentucky bluegrass) when the temperatures are in the 60s and it's not going to frost, so either early autumn or mid-late spring. Autumn is preferred, because then it gets the spring season to grow in that temperature, too, but spring'll work pretty much fine.

I think the guy I talked to was a putz, really, because what he was telling me doesn't match very well against what I'm finding on the Internet. Despite that, still might want sod in the front, just because leaving it dirt for that long seems sub-optimal.

[angeyja.livejournal.com]

It's going to be a bad couple of weeks for Work, alas, so I really ought to go check on the laundry and then get to it.

Very best wishes with that, Kate.

[kate_nepveu]

Thanks.

[texas-tiger.livejournal.com]

Jpegs of your haircut?

[kate_nepveu]

Not likely, but I'll keep it in mind if we break out the camera for something else.

WHOA!

[seawasp]

Kate!

It hadn't penetrated until I was reading the above and saw "Union Street" and "Albany". Have we met physically? Because we're in the same area; I lived in Schenectady for many years, now I live in Troy.

WHOA yourself!

[kate_nepveu]

Yeah, we're in the Capital District. I don't think we've met in person--maybe seen each other in passing at Albacon.

Did you know your web page was down, btw? I figured nitty-gritty details about where we live would be better in e-mail, so went there on a hunt for it, but no go.