Rental House Lawn

JMD

Last winter I moved into a rental house in the Atlanta area. The yard was not in great shape and until recently I've just been mowing it as needed and putting a little water on it every now an then. Over the past few weekends I've been cutting back the overgrown brush/trees, cleaning out the beds around the house, and generally sprucing up the outside of the house. I also sprayed some weed killer as there is/was a fairly significant amount of weeds. The result of all this is that the poor condition of the lawn stands out even more.

I'll try to attach some pictures but I'm thinking that I've got primarily a Zoysia/clover/crabgrass blend going on. There are also some bare areas where I've killed some of the weeds and from where I cleaned out the back of the yard. Since this is a rental house I'm not looking to spend a ton of money and lay sod but I would like to get some grass growing.

So I'm wondering if this actually is zoysia and what I can do this fall. Everything I've read seems to indicate it's probably too late to plant zoysia seed and that overseeding isn't great for the existing zoysia grass. Should I go ahead and put some zoysia seed down and hope it stays warm? Should I go with some sort of rye or fescue for the winter and then reevaluate in the early spring? Should I just say "screw it, it's a rental" and let the clover and crabgrass completely retake the lawn?





Thanks,

JD

sdsester

I would think about raking it, feeding it, and overseeding with an ANNUAL rye as you asked. See what you have next spring. If you were to plant perennial rye or fescue it would just end up competing with zoysia and be in your way if that is what you want. Zoysia is a warm weather species so the seed might be slow to germinate or even lay dormant if you put it down in the Fall.

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