Grass

I bet you clicked on this thread hoping it was about pot? Dope head hahaha!
Well sorry Maybe try yourastoner.com
Its about my lawn. With only one day a week to have the sprinklers on I usually just hand water 3 times a week.
My question is to all the green thumbs out there. When is the best time to water your lawn?
At night so the water can soak in? Will watering the lawn on a hot day burn the lawn? Shoud it be soaked?
Any tip to having the greenest and best looking lawn in the street would help

I could give you reams of lawn care tips but I am not going to as I don't want to subject you to the most mind numbingly gormless occupation that man has devised.

Kill it with weed mat and plant shrubs, you will never regret it. You can throw your lawn mower away and extend your life expectancy and add more value to your existence!

Late afternoon, around sunset...gives the water a chance to reach the roots without evaporating. Watering on a hot day will cook the grass & most of the water will be lost to evap.

Or...all the above. Lawn grass isn't a native, so if you want to be truly 'green', attempt to revert the yard to what it originally was...good luck with that!

I'm all for the native shrub back to original yadda yadda yadda,

but there's something about a freshly mown lawn......

makes me think i should do it more often...

and cease to be the one house in the street whom everyone thinks is abandoned

You should water early morning like 0400 - 0500 in summer.

Reason is plants use water in the daytime

Water + CO2 + cholorophyll + sunlight = glucose or something like that. At night the plants use the energy from the day and if you burn glucose you produce water as a byproduct.....some of which is lost out thru the leaves. That is why your grass is damp in the morning) Well that is my hazy recollection of biology... but in short they use water in the day and at night it is no good to them they only take up a bit
So no point watering at sunset

Other thing is too much watering makes the plant shallow rooted (why build lotsa deep roots looking for water if you don't have to) so it is less drought tolerant and less hardy in general.

People get all upset about water rostering (I do too, because of the reasons it is implimented.....) however really it is good for the gardens. One good soaking per week in spring and 2 good soakings per week in summer is good for roots. 10mins every day is not.

Agree with wetting agent too. I'm told you can use dishwashing detergent applied very weakly as apparently that Wettasoil is nothing special and expensive. Haven't tried detergent meselves though......

What Mark said..

and wetta soil put on by watering can once every 3 months...
and watered in.
I actually don't water from about April till October...
don't need to
and these days my fertilizer is a Tea of poo
which I put on every thing

Yeah thinking about giving up the gigolo thing and becoming a greenkeeper

Manscaped to landscaped. Schweet. Just need a bigger mower......

Yeah,. wot Mark_Aus said,.. mostly.
Except for the "too much watering makes the grass shallow rooted"

I think he meant watering too often makes grass shallow rooted.
If you water it too much, then the water soaks deeper down and the roots follow it down, thus making them deeper rooted,.

Growing grass is all just a solar powered energy system. It works like this.
When the sun shines, the grass stores the incoming energy by converting the CO2 in the atmosphere plus water from the soil into celluose products.
You can get this energy back anytime by just drying the grass out and burning it. What you get back is the same energy that fell on the grass as it was growing, less whatever was lost in inefficiencies in the growing process.

Or,.. you can feed the grass to cows and they convert the low grade energy stored in the grass to higher grade or more dense energy stored as meat and fat. It's still the same energy that fell on the grass as it was growing but less of it due to inefficiencies in the process.
e.g. they seem to plop lots of it on the ground so you can step in it from time to time when you're not paying sufficient attention. It's a free service they provide to add some variation to your otherwise dull life.
Then,.. when they have stored enough, they present themselves to be shot so we can eat them. It's another service they freely provide.

So after we eat them, we convert the energy in the meat and fat into energy to go windsurfing which makes us breath out CO2 back into the atmosphere.
It's still the same energy that fell on the grass but less of it due to inefficiencies in the process.

The CO2 is then used to grow more grass, and around it goes again,.. and again,.. and,..
So get that grass growing, and LOTS OF IT!

Nebbs that would not suprise me I heard it from some dood on the internet

Wettasoil granular (lasts longer) cost me $50 to do front and back lawn about errmmm maybe 500sqm. Plus fertiliser makes it about $100 for a joint I don't own.

Mondo grass pain in the arse to plant it but i have it havent mowed it once pulled a few weeds and thats about it just dont let the dog piss on it turns yellow

This is exactly that....a fashion. These systems are designed, and are great for soils which are high in clay content. Not so great (crap) for your typical west australian sand pit, and especially under lawns. People end up having to run these systems for a long time to get any benefit from them in WA and probably end up using more water. And god help you when you have blockages, and air-locks. I would avoid these systems at all costs. Oh they are a rip off for what they are too.

funny you should mention the clay soils. I have installed a few of these systems in kalgoorlie clay soils and no longer install them , I reckon they only work in sandy soils.
couple of suggestions for your lawn. dont put one down on sandy soils, or clayey soils. you really need a 50/50 blend.
this advice is completely useless as you have a lawn on the wrong soil already. so if your soil is sand , a light topdress with clay and gypsum. if your soil is clay add some course sand.
wetasoil( not the brand) is basically a variation on gypsum, so if you let your lawn dry out( by infrequent watering) it drys and becomes relatively useless, even sealing the top of the soil.
avoid things that compact your lawn like cars , motorised lawn mowers........

you can see where all the traffic goes in the middle of the photos. the dry area on the left is where our soil is really thin over hard calcrete and rock.
the grass is kikuyu with buffalo runners added in the shady areas. this lawn actually looks better in winter as it is well protected from frost

regular fertilizing gives your lawn the green colour, but little else.
On my own lawn i have large shady trees around the perimeter but with the understorey raised and the canopy lightly thinned, to allow light and air to flow through, thus cooling the garden in summer. I see many people in kal remove the trees as they feel that it is stopping the grass from growing, but you need to remember that the trees keep the natural water table down and so reduce the amount of salts that build up in the top few inches due to evaporation
the back lawn is 150m sq and has 50% shade at any time of day.
the dryest parts of the garden are next to where I have paved, having been encouraged by water saving experts..
Pehaps you could look at more grey water recycling . all our washing machine water goes through the laundry wall into a 200l drum the gravity feeds onto the lawn. we move it around to the various fruit trees as they are fruiting and to the dryer spots on the lawn.
the reason for the drum is that washing machine pumps arnt designed to pump far or with much head, so they burn out with a long hose attached.
mind you grey water puddling on you lawn is illegal( health department)
Our set up was once photograhed by a watercorp rep and we were told that it was a great idea, then 6 months later the photo appeared in a Waterwise presentation as being bad AND illegal. 3 people at the lecture rang me to have a laugh
Im rather impressd by all the good tips and ideas Ive read here. maybe we are starting to pay attention

^^^^^^^^^^thats gotta suck

Yep...... move to Victoria too much growth here !!!

new motto ... "if it grows it goes"