Question
In early June, my husband recently installed a sprinkler system and blue-rye sod in our backyard. It is a beautiful grass - deep green and thinner blade. We live near Sacramento so it does get quite warm here in the summer so he wanted to be certain to install the sod before it got too hot. The sod looked wonderful the first month - he watered it frequently and it grew tall and thick. After 4 weeks he mowed it but now it doesn't look very good. It seems where the mower's tires were, there are "tracks" left in the sod, and this is still after about 10 days. There are patches of the sod now where you can see the soil underneath. He is now only watering the grass twice a day, once at 8 AM and again at noon for 10 minutes each time and the grass remains very soggy. Is the sod getting too much water now? Did mowing the grass while it was probably too damp damage the sod? What should we do? (Also, our neighbor has a very large tree that does cast shade on the lawn so an area of the grass maybe gets 4-5 hours of direct sunlight a day, the rest of the time it is in shade. We would like our neighbor to trim his tree, but that is another story!) Thanks so much.

Answer
It sounds like someone traipsed over the grass, at least once with a mower, while it was wet.

This should NEVER happen.

Of course it does.  But the damage is compounded when you are dealing with something new, like a newly seeded Lawn, or newly rolled Sod.

This is not a rug you can vacuum to get the pile standing up straight again.  This is Grass.

You put this sod down in JUNE?  Watering the dickens out of Cool Season Grass in the middle of the Summer is done, but it's all intended to keep the Grass from going dormant and staying Green.  It's like you trying to sleep, and someone keeps slapping you in the face, keeping you awake.  That's what is going on with the Grass.  And people do it, but it is NOT good for the Grass.

So a lot of things here are going on that are not good for the Grass.  Someone has to put a stop to all this anti-Grass activity, or it won't recover.  Plain and simple.

Don't even tell me what chemicals your husband put down to kill Weeds and boost Grass growth in 20 different directions.  That's bad for the Grass too.

STOP!

1.  Water the Grass ONLY when it needs it.  If the Soil is WET, the Grass does not need it.  You think tire tracks are a problem?  Wait 'til you see Brown Patch and Striped Smut traveling up and down the property.  Your Grass is a Fungus epidemic waiting to happen.

2.  ESPECIALLY don't walk on Soil or Grass when they are wet.  Let them dry out, and then leave them alone.  Walk on it when you have a reason, as in, when it is being mowed -- and this is ONLY when it's BONE DRY.

3.  GENTLY rake the Grass in the right direction.  Overseed the patches with -- I know you're not going to do this but I'll say it anyway -- Clover, to fill in the bare spaces with something that's good for the Grass and bad for the Weeds.  Clover pours Nitrogen into the Soil.  Clover-fixed Nitrogen makes Grass very happy.  Your Grass is not happy.  Anything you can do to make your Grass happy will make it more beautiful.  And then YOU will be happy, too.

Remember, these are Cool Season Grasses.  They DON'T GROW when it gets hot.  They evolved over millions of years into Grass that shuts down all operations in the heat of Summer.  It does not matter what view you have of the ocean, what flowers are growing around it, or how much the homeowners love it.  They do not have the equipment to grow full speed ahead in Summer.  This is why they call it Cool Season Grass.

Bluegrass, except for some very elite hybrids, can't deal with heat OR shade.  The Grass in the slight shade will be slightly less beautiful.  Unless you are going to hook up a UV lamp to that part of the Lawn, that Grass will be getting less chlorophyll building light, less energy, and probably more Fungus attack if you keep watering it.  By the way, don't you people have a water shortage?

I wonder why?

Twice a day?  The Grass is a month and a half old now.  Holy moly.

Please note: I did not tell you that you should not mow the Grass when it is 'too' damp.  I said you should not mow it when it is DAMP.  Period. ONLY when it is BONE DRY should you mow it.

If you play your cards right, the Grass will fade a little until the Cool weather sets in.  What 'Cool' weather is in Sacramento, I don't know, but for Cool Season Grass, temps in the 60s and 70s are heavenly.  The Grass you are growing is not supposed to look its best in June, July and August -- those are the months where Bermudagrass and St Augustinegrass steal the show.  Go with the flow.  Accept the things you cannot change.  EZ does it.  This is Cool Season Grass.  It makes a beautiful, rich, Green Lawn... in the Cool days of Spring and Autumn.  Maybe for you, Winter too.  For 10 weeks a year, it needs to rest.

Good luck and keep me posted.

THE LONG ISLAND GARDENER