Buying new sod. It's a big investment, and a lot can go wrong without careful preparation of your site. Sod that dies is most often due to not following a couple of best practices to care for the sod after installation. Grass doesn't just die. It suffers from neglect or mismanagement. At Soils Alive, since 1997 we've provided DFW homeowners with organic lawn care backed by science that prevents weeds, insects, and diseases and helps support healthy turfgrass. In 25+ years, we've learned many of the common problems homeowners face. Here's our 10 Tips to Help New Sod Thrive.
10 Tips to Help New Sod Thrive
1. Buy Fresh, Healthy Grass
It kind of goes without saying: if you go cheap on your sod, the finished lawn just isn't going to look great. If you're working with a local DFW company, that's great. Good turf should be delivered within 72 hours of being cut, and as soon as it's delivered, it needs to be installed immediately. Right then.....not 3 hours later.
Warm-season grasses (Bermuda, St. Augustine, Zoysia) "wake-up" in the spring once soil temperatures rise. They go dormant in the fall when temperatures go down. Just like a perennial plant, the roots haven't died. They're just dormant. Because of this, the idea that you shouldn't install sod until after March 1 is a common misunderstanding. In the heat of summer, watering enough is a real challenge. You can install sod earlier in the year, so that it gets rooted in before the heat of summer arrives.
We’ve gotten calls from homeowners who bought old sod (more than 3 days old) and it didn’t root very well. It's cheap for a reason. In some cases, they ended up having to go back and get fresh sod and do it all over again. Buy from a company that delivers sod that is fresh. You won’t regret it. When you do it right…..you only have to do it once. When you try to save some pennies, doing it twice can cost you double.
2. Hire a Quality Installer
Healthy sod will thrive on a site that’s prepared well.....when it gets installed well. Sod is going to be your only option to install during spring and summer, because grass seed will get scorched as it germinates by our 100 degree DFW summers before it can root effectively. Putting great sod onto a landscape that wasn’t prepared properly means that your lawn is going to look funny. There may be imperfections that are noticeable for years to come. And that's if it survives.
Good site prep includes removing existing vegetation, tilling, and leveling the site as well as flagging irrigation risers, and smoothing the sod after laying it. Your lawn is the first impression people have of your home. Spending money to have it installed professionally is worth every penny. Ask any Realtor and they’ll tell you: the lawn matters a lot. It’s the first thing someone sees when they pull up for a tour of your home. An uneven lawn can't be mowed properly, leading to scalping which creates yellow patches in the lawn. Not great for resale value or curb appeal. Don’t get lowballed when you sell your home. Protect the home's value and hire someone to install it correctly.
3. Remember: Trees Get Bigger
Trees are great. They cool our homes and create shade to keep us protected from UV rays and summer heat. They add tremendous resale value to a home when kept in good shape. But we can’t forget that trees grow. Just because you have enough sunlight now doesn’t mean in 5-10 years your yard will have enough to keep St. Augustine happy.
Think about the amount of sunlight you will be losing in the coming years. Especially from Magnolia, Live Oak, and Red Oaks. If you have the extra room in your budget, consider Zoysia which is more shade tolerant, but also loves the sun. Trimming your big trees can cost $2000/year or more, just to provide more sunlight to St. Augustine below. Spend a little more on Zoysia now.....to save a lot in the long run.
4. Add Organic Matter
If you’re like most DFW homeowners, you have heavy clay soil. Clay is wonderful. It holds water much better than sandy soil. Grass grows well in clay, so long as it’s not heavily compacted. During heavy rains, though, clay can shed a lot of the free rain that falls. As much as 3” of a 4” heavy rain can shed off of your lawn, especially if you have a significant slope. That's free water literally going down the drain. You then have to pay to bring it back to your lawn.
Consider adding 2-3” of compost and/or topsoil, before you lay your sod. Yes, it means paying more money. But these products both contain a lot of organic matter, which holds water like a sponge. Average clay soil in DFW has about 4% organic matter. Soil with 5% organic matter can hold another 2500 gallons of water (for an average 5000 square foot lawn). That means a lower water bill for the life of your lawn, and less drought stress. Compost also breaks down (thanks to healthy microbes in Liquid Compost, and thanks to earthworms) which will help your grass roots grow deeper.
5. Take the Time to Water Properly
Check with your sod installer for specific instructions for your site. They will know better than us what you'll need to do. As a general rule, after installing your new sod, you want your sprinklers to run so that the top 4-6" of soil get moist, and stay moist. As the roots are growing, for the first 7-10 days, they need consistent moisture, not allowing the soil to dry out. That usually means watering for 15 minutes at 8am and another 15 at 5pm. But you might water for 10 minutes at 8, 12, and 5.
If it has rained, you'll want to hold off on watering. Rain water from a thunderstorm actually brings free Nitrogen fertilizer to your grass in the form of ammonium (NH4) and nitrates (NOx). City water will wash it away, though. You can ask an irrigation company to help you install a rain senor, that way you don't run your sprinklers during a rain. A soil sensor will even keep your sprinklers off, if the soil is still moist after rain.
In the summer, you'll need a Water Exemption from your city. Be sure and put in your request before you start watering at times not permitted by the city. Lots of sprinkler systems have defects, and most homeowners don't even know. Consider an irrigation system audit, before you pay for new sod, to discover any problems. This might be provided free by your city. When you run your sprinklers, go out and see where the water falls. If there are spots that are missed, you'll need to hand water these.....otherwise the new sod will probably die.
You can get a $15 moisture meter online that will also show you if you are watering enough. Stick it in your lawn 6" deep, and check more than just one spot. Remember that areas in full sun will dry out faster than areas in shade, so be sure and provide more water in these hot sunny areas. Soils Alive can offer you a New Sod Water Retention treatment (a surfactant/humectant) that can help your new sod retain the water you apply more effectively.
6. Provide Liquid Compost
You may have heard that a spoonful of soil has more microbes than there are people in the world. And while that's true, it's really only true of healthy soil. DFW soils, scraped clean by housing developers and then treated by harsh pesticides for decades, often have much less life in them. And they need more life.
New sod doesn’t need any fertilizer. In fact, high-nitrogen fertilizer can harm it. One thing you can add to your new sod is Liquid Compost. This is a product made from the tea of earthworm compost and it provides beneficial microbes that will help bring new life to your soil, soften clay, improve rainfall infiltration, and promote root growth. Liquid Compost has an NPK under 1-1-1 and it will no burn new sod (it also contains humates, liquid molasses, and seaweed extracts).
Liquid Compost can help provide overall health for your lawn by providing nutrients such as calcium, sulfur, magnesium and trace amounts of boron, chlorine, manganese, iron, zinc, copper, molybdenum, and silicon. These nutrients improve the cell wall strength of plants, building resistance against insects and disease.
7. Promote Healthy Roots
We want grass roots to go down deep. 6” is much better than 4” for drought resilience during a DFW summer because they can access 50% more soil moisture. To help the roots grow, try to avoid compacting the soil with the weight of your own feet, which can make root growth more difficult. Don’t mow until the grass gets about 4” high, in about 3-4 weeks in the summertime.
After 10 days, check for root growth by tugging up on a corner of sod. It may take a bit longer than 10 days but as the sod roots, reduce your watering. Your sod installer can provide you with specific instructions for your site. In general, once rooting occurs, you’ll reduce watering to once a day for the next week, after 10pm and before 6am is best. Then go to every other day for the next 1-2 weeks, and then a regular schedule of every 3-4 days (during summer) or once a week (in the fall and winter) if you haven’t had rain.
Once your sod has been down for a month, let the soil dry out in between waterings. Grass roots will grow more deeply in search of water. A digital soil moisture meter (about $300-400), connected to your irrigation system, can prevent your sprinklers from running if there's still available moisture in your lawn. Without this, most systems will run the day after it rains.....pushing your water bill up way too high.
8. Mow Carefully
For the first mowing, ensure that mowing blades are sharp. Dull blades can tug on the grass and disrupt the young roots. Mow at the highest setting, to remove no more than 1/3 of the grass leaf height, once the grass is 4” tall. Leaving the grass clippings in place will provide shade for the soil, cooling the earth and keeping the roots protected from the harsh sun, especially helpful for Bermuda and St. Augustine.
Liquid Compost provides microbes that will eat the clippings/thatch, preventing build up. This is particularly important for a thick sod like Zoysia. Unhealthy soil that lacks healthy microbes is not able to break down thatch, and the buildup provides a humid environment where fungal diseases can thrive. We don’t want that. The first few months after you lay your sod will require more frequent mowing. Cutting just 1" off your 4" tall grass will avoid stress, though it will mean more work for the first several months.
9. Be Careful with Nitrogen
New sod does not need a high NPK fertilizer. Nitrogen is helpful in the spring for greening up but for new sod, it’s root growth we want to promote. After the new sod's first winter, as the spring approaches, a green-up fertilization (1 pound Nitrogen per 1000 square feet) can help put on spring color. Zoysia especially benefits from additional nitrogen, as it greens up a bit later than other grass types.
Too much nitrogen can cause weak growth that attracts insects and disease. A slow-release nitrogen will avoid many of the problems caused by excessive nitrogen. If applying a fertilizer with 10% nitrogen, you’d need 10 pounds per 1000 square feet, or 50 pounds for a 5000 square foot yard. Some non-organic fertilizers have as much as 28% nitrogen! It’s easy to overdo it, so be cautious. More is not better. Using less is often better.
10. Use less Herbicide
Don't apply herbicide to new sod until 3+ months after the sod was put down, because herbicide can (sometimes) injure new sod. If you start seeing weeds, and so long as the sod has been in place at least 90 days, consider a spot-treatment of herbicide instead of mixing herbicide in with a liquid fertilizer. We can also recommend DIY tips on how to treat your weeds organically, with zero toxic pesticides.
If you have weeds in 20% of your 5000 square foot lawn, then you only need to treat 1000 square feet. 4000 square feet don’t require any treatment. Spot treatment means using 80% less herbicide. Pesticides of any kind disrupt healthy soil life. Unhealthy soils get compacted, making it hard for grass to thrive, causing more weeds to grow. Some lawn care companies mix herbicide into their liquid fertilizer, meaning that they are spraying this across 100% of your lawn, multiple times a year.
DFW organic lawn care, since 1997
We hope these 10 tips help you as you begin planning your new sod project. If you have a sod company and a sod installer lined up, that's great. If you need a recommendation, let us know. We hope that whoever you chose, you only need to put sod down once.
At Soils Alive, we've offered organic lawn care for DFW homeowners since 1997. Our 500+ Google reviews tell our story best. Do you have questions or concerns about your new sod project? Want to get a quote for our organic lawn care service? Our plans start at just $55/month. Give us a call, or fill out our form (below) and we'll be in touch with you soon.