A New Lawn

In my private business as a landscape gardener, I am developing an area of land in Gouves to act as a base. Part of the site is a display area and, to that end, I have been sowing a lawn.

And, I am a great advocate of "warm season grasses," or grass that naturally grows in hot, dry climates and, therefore, do not require as much water. It is worth noting that many of the cheap seed mixes available are not really suited for withstanding the heat of a Cretan summer.

The most commonly available "warm season" species is Bermuda grass (Cynodon dactylon). The wild type is often added to seed mixes to increase the drought tolerance of the resulting la wn. It is not, however, a very strong green and this colour often fades even more during winter. Modern varieties of Bermuda grass have been developed that are a deeper green in colour, which is retained better during the winter. Expect to pay a little more for this seed, however.

In a previous column I wrote about Seashore paspalum. Like Bermuda grass, seashore paspalum is a warm season grass which has been developed for golf courses. It wasn’t available as a seed and was only available as "sprigs" (small plugs that have to be planted) or as turf. Despite the cost it has become increasingly popular because it is said to only require half the water that Bermuda grass does. Unfortunately, shipping costs put the use of these varieties out of my reach.

Enter the Scott’s Seed Company. They are marketing the only available Seashore paspalum seed called Seaspray. This is the seed that I have sown.

I had access to my land in March so I gave repeat sprays of glyphosate weed killer to clear the site of weeds (I still anticipate getting a good crop of weed seedlings however). The land had previously been roughly ploughed and so I used a tractor-mounted rotavator to further reduce the surface to a finer tilth and to level the area a little better.

Before the seed could be applied, the surface had to be further broken down and smoothed. This was done with a hand rake. A lot of stones came to the surface during these cultivations. The larger stones were removed, but the smaller ones were left to be pushed back into the surface.

The whole area was then consolidated evenly by tramping it down with the heels of my boots (the best way to describe this action is to imagine impersonating a penguin’s waddle).

Next, I applied a fertilizer. The main ingredients of a fertilizer are nitrogen (N), phosphorus (P), and potassium (K) and the numbers that you see on the front of a bag show the ratios of these three main ingredients. Generally speaking, most turf fertilizers are high in nitrogen because this is what the plant uses to create strong, green leaves. It is also very soluble so it dissolves in irrigation or rain water and washes away (a process called leaching). I, however, did not want to use a high concentration of nitrogen on a new lawn. It is important to get the roots of new plants established and this is where the phosphorus and potassium comes in. I used a formulation of 17-12-17. This I applied evenly at 35grammes per square metre and again, lightly raked the surface.

Next came the seed. This again was evenly spread over the entire surface at a rate of 10grammes per square metre. Many people would then call that job finished, but I like to very lightly rake the seed in. This is for two reasons: first, the seed gets mixed into the surface, some deeper than others. If for some reason the new lawn gets too much water then those on the surface will have a better chance of germination, whilst if the soil is allowed to get too dry the deeper seeds will have the advantage. My other reason is purely aesthetic; who wants to see great footprints all over the clean surface?

The main task now is watering. The seed should not be allowed to dry out nor is it necessary to water too deep. Little and often is the key. As the grass develops, I will cut down on the frequency of watering but increase the quantity to encourage the roots to grow deeply into the soil.

Getting water onto the lawn is a whole subject in itself, which I will discuss next month.