(Part 2) Best products from r/landscaping

Hello! I don't know whether you're new up in the PNW or not, but this is completely normal up here in the summer. Our grasses are lovely and green all winter long but without a LOT of summer water, they turn brown and look dead in the summer.

If your yard is full of weeds and you have your heart set on a carpet of grass, then yanking it all out and seeding and babying a new lawn isn't a bad way to go.

I can recommend this book too:

http://www.amazon.com/Organic-Lawn-Care-Manual-Low-Maintenance/dp/1580176496

Lots of practical information about types of grass that grow in particular soils, and how to care for it and when to perform certain maintenance chores.

Your lawn will be FAR healthier if you eschew the weed-and-feed and chemical fertilizers and instead grow the right grass for this area and let it grow deep roots. Lawn chemicals are bad for you and especially bad for pets and small children, so if you can pull your weeds by hand or tolerate some as part of the green rug and not mind, you're doing the land and your health a favor. (The grass won't look as perfect, of course, but it comes down to what you prefer and whether we yay-natural hippies an win you over.)

Other advice that I found sound - when moving to a new house, do very little in the first year. You don't know yet where your wet spots are going to be in the winter or in a storm, or what parts of your yard will be sunny or shady in which season. We get a LOT of movement with the sun this far north. You will be able to better understand whether you plan for wet or dry, shade or sun, once you've observed a year's cycle in place. (If you can't wait, there's shade-and-sun mixes of grass seed - just plant everything and let what wants to grow grow!).

TLDR - brown yard is normal this time of year in the PNW, wait for fall to see what it REALLY looks like, read a great book about lawn care, and please consider going without the lawn care chemical section of bigbox stores.

Enjoy your new home in any case!!!!!

This fence line is just shy of 90 feet and my setup works pretty well at that length. I used pretty small diameter pvc so it’s not much weight; I can’t imagine reinforcement would be needed for the watering— maybe for the vines depending. It’s not a raging torrent of water it basically is just a steady drip but it saturates pretty well when run in cycles and not run during the heat of the day.

My initial version of this setup was a single battery and small solar panel and it ran fine for a year or more (granted I’m in SoCal so we get a lot of sun)— I’ve since expanded a bit to a 4 battery setup and larger panel but just because I added two more pumps for covering other areas.

Here’s a picture of the control box of a basic single battery system with timer and a simple solar controller
https://i.imgur.com/JOfGqdp.jpg


Here’s some of the basic gear:

Water Storage
===========================

Current Water tank
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B003H9WJMI/

(Although I’ve also used smaller/cheaper tanks like this for my vegetable garden, just might mean more refills depending on how often it’s run: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01BFC5NIA/ )

If you’re looking to go super cheap, I honestly started my first setup with a couple modified 5 gallon plastic water bottles I stole from my office like these: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B003B27RAA/


Power
===========================

Current solar panel for a 4 battery setup:
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07HFMBF3G

Previous panel for single battery system:
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00PFGP0EA


Solar regulator (keeps you from blowing up the battery! The smaller panel comes free with one that works fine, I just liked this one better because it had more lights!): https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00L37KZI6/

Batteries, one is plenty for a single pump system:
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B003S1RQ2S/

(obviously if you wanted to build a system on the cheap you could bypass the solar entirely and drop $20 on a second battery that you leave charging and just swap them back and forth every week or three, depending on how often/long you run the system)


Pump
===========================

Current Pump:
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B072BXBQGC/

Although I’ve also used cheaper ones like these for drip systems and they were fine:
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07699RMVB

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00WYMC492

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00DLKT4OO


Misc
===========================

Timer (has like 16 stop/start memories which should be plenty for any configuration):
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0090MTLFO


If there is some interest next weekend I could draw up a complete wiring/assembly diagram and detailed parts list and make a separate post (and include all the sundries: wire, hose, clamps, filters, waterproof project box, couplings, drip heads, etc).

Sorry in advance for the novel, unless you're into that kind of thing. Bear in mind again, this isn't professional advice by any means. I've just been researching this as we'll be planning and applying for a grant from our local sewer district very soon so I've been through a couple of courses and doing as much research as possible. In other words, I'm the most dangerous person on the internet and professionals hate me, but only because they have to fix what I've screwed up :).

We're also in the Midwest which means a good measure of rain in the spring. It looks as though you have a fair amount of roof to account for. You can use drainage guides like this to account for the ~exact amount of runoff your roof will yield during a storm. I've seen calculations where they say "take the square footage of your roof and multiply that by the number of inches rain you got and that's how much runoff you have!". It's not quite that simple as rain isn't (generally) an instantaneous figure but rather multiplied over time.

Q = (C x I x A) / 96.23 where

>Q = Storm Water Runoff (in gallons per minute, gpm)

>C = Coefficient of Runoff

>I = Rainfall Intensity (in inches per hour)

>A = Area of Drainage Zone (in square feet)

I like simple logic problems like this so if you DON'T, you can just take the square footage of your roof and multiply it by the average rainfall per rain event i.e. 600 square feet of roof x .5" rain = ~187 gallons of water :). This, in conjunction with the square footage per downspout, will give you a pretty good indicator of how much water you'll be dealing with on which parts of your property. The street is probably sloped from the center line down and you should also include your driveway and any applicable graded turf as most lawn turf isn't all that permeable in anything but the lightest misting.

Say for example your roof, driveway, street, and turf have a cumulative runoff of 500 gallons in a 1/2" rainfall. If ~200 of that comes from your roof, this is the water you can control. Depending on the number of downspouts you have in use, 2-4 50+ gallon rain catch barrels will easily soak up the 200 gallons in runoff just from your roof lines. Any overflow from those barrels can be run to that 4" pipe you mentioned which routes into the back yard.

Regarding the driveway, if you don't have them already I would look into trenched drainage systems. this would allow you to grade your driveway (per the image) from left to right so that any runoff from the street and drive routes to that pipe which runs along the side of your garage. Other than permeable pavement solutions ($$$$) there isn't much you can do with driveway runoff other than mitigate it. On that note, your 4" drain pipe may be sufficient but you can use calculators like this one to ascertain whether or not a larger 6" drain would be needed. Also keep in mind if you have silt or debris issues at the base of your drive where it meets the garage you'll need to get that addressed before you add any drains so you don't foul the pipes down stream with garbage.

Back to rain gardens. To use the 5'x20' example from my first post, a 100 square foot rain garden dug even 9" into the ground will give you ~75 cubic feet of reservoir or 100 cubic feet if you can make it a foot deep. This isn't just storage though as any plant matter you include in the garden will aid in slowing and soaking up storm water runoff. The average root depth of most turf grass is about as deep as the grass itself. However even smaller, decorative plants can have root structures many times their depth. These types of root structures will absorb an order of magnitude more runoff than turf grass and help maintain slope health of your yard (depending on the grade coming down from the street and whether or not you have erosion issues). You can either plant along side the driveway or plant parallel to the street so that the majority of the turf/street runoff is caught. Any rain garden requires an overflow which could then be tied into your driveway drain or drain on the other side of the driveway.

Since this will be a DIY scenario (as will ours) most of the cost will be in landscaping materials like plants and stone, but you can use the comparatively cheaper dry wells and rain barrels in conjunction with one another to form a kind of mesh runoff mitigation network. Say the rain barrels affixed directly to the gutters catch 200 gallons and you have a rain garden (or two or three, they don't have to be connected) which will collect another ~100. You could dig a dry well into series between the garden and the side drain to give another 50 gallon capacity or however many gallons you choose to utilize. Out of the original 500 gallon runoff (roof, driveway, street, lawn) these collection measures would 350-400 gallons not including the somewhat unquantifiable plant and root absorption as well as the driveway trench which will definitely aid in moving the water past your foundation.

Again, sorry for the novel :). Take what you need and ignore the rest. We don't have much of a grade at all in our land, but what little slope we do have near the foundation is unfortunately tilted towards the house and poorly drained at that and I'm realizing it's not going to be a simple task. There isn't one major resolution in most cases. I understand a rain garden solution isn't for everyone, but our orientations emphasized that while a metric ton of native plants is going to be more effective than fewer plants you can still get away with a modern looking landscape so your front lawn doesn't look like a prairie. Also, I would look into natural plant species as they're far more likely to thrive in your native soil and I personally prefer perennials so I don't have to replant every damn year. Feel free to PM me with any questions, or even to seek advice from a real professional :).

I don't have any specific design input, but it sounds like you need help with the vision. Check this out: https://www.amazon.com/Reimagining-California-Lawn-Water-conserving-Practices/dp/0978997123.

California Native Grassland Association had a series of workshops for people ripping out their lawns. I don't see any schedule for 2017 but are some info materials here: https://cnga.wildapricot.org/New-Front-Yard. You might look at the Sacramento or Merced brochures, a similar climate. Also have you looked for local lawn replacement resources? Look here: http://www.fresnogardening.org/. Also worth looking into turf replacement rebates if you haven't already.

https://www.facebook.com/events/172682489844610/.

https://clovisbotanicalgarden.org/the-garden/. Not sure how well this garden is maintained but it's good to see some examples for inspiration and take notes on what you like. Might be worth a visit.

I am a huge fan of working California native plants into gardens. If you're not familiar with them, I encourage you to learn about them! So many awesome plants and well suited for our climate.

http://www.calscape.org/plant_nursery.php

http://www.laspilitas.com/easy/easy.html

The pond looks lovely!

I'm not a landscaping professional but an environmental engineer and what you basically want to do here is dredging so I feel I can offer you some advice.

If you want to do this more or less for free you'll need a rake and a some sort of boat. You can scoop the leaves out. It will take a lot of man hours, especially if this hasn't happened in the last 30 years. You can use the decaying leaves, by making a compost pile and letting them compost for a while longer before use in your garden. I wouldn't worry about wildlife here too much. Species that life in these types of highly organic, low in oxygen sediments aren't threatened and really don't do much good for the ecological balance in a pond like this. You can leave the leaves at the banks for a couple of days if you want to save the frog population, they'll get out and back into the water.

Alternatively you can buy a pond vacuum cleaner (something like this http://www.amazon.com/OASE-PondoVac-Classic-Vacuum-Cleaner/dp/B004HIHUTA). It will cost you about 200 bucks and you'll still need a boat and plenty of man hours. Your pond is quite large.

And a third alternative: you can hire a company to do it for you. They'll bring professional equipment and get the job done quickly. That will be 500 bucks or more though, depending on where you live.

After you've removed the sediments you're not done though. I'm suprised you mentioned not having algae problems. Have you seen the pond during warm weather yet? In a pond with a big amount of leaves I'd expect some algal blooms or duckweed covers during summer. If you do experience troubles with that you might want to consider putting a layer of 20 cm or so of clean sand to cover up the current sediment. The quality of that sediment won't be very good for aquatic live (very eutrophic with a high oxygen demand). A layer of clean sand will soften the effects.

Also, in the future you do need to prevent a new leave build up. You can prevent the majority of leaves from getting in by putting a net over it in autumn/winter or by cutting down trees close to the pond (a 10 meter perimeter will do).

Would you like to leave the pond as it is or would you like to use it for swimming or for fish? If you'd like to keep fish or clean enough water for humans to swim, you'll need some additional work like trying to develop a healthy vegetation (helps to keep the water clear and oxygenated).

The plantsman's bible is Dirr's Manual. It has a very horticultural slant, but is invaluable for someone truly dedicated to plants. It is 1300 pages of comprehensive plant knowledge and will tell you exactly how to germinate seeds of Trochodendron aralioides. The problem for most is that it has no pictures - only line drawings of leaf shapes. This is probably not the book you need, but is a tremendous resource for someone with a thirst for knowledge.

http://www.amazon.com/Manual-Woody-Landscape-Plants-Characteristics/dp/1588748685/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&qid=1408405815&sr=8-4&keywords=dirr%27s+encyclopedia+of+trees+and+shrubs

My favorite plant book for casual reading is Dirr's Encyclopedia of Trees and Shrubs. It has color photos of seemingly every tree and shrub in existence, as well as discussions of their landscape value.

http://www.amazon.com/Dirrs-Encyclopedia-Trees-Shrubs-Michael/dp/0881929018/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1408405815&sr=8-1&keywords=dirr%27s+encyclopedia+of+trees+and+shrubs

When I was a budding plantsman, my father gave me a very useful book which I still refer to today. This National Arboretum publication gives a broad overview of all different types of plants(vines, annuals, perennials, evergreens, aquatic plants, shade trees, etc) and is a great way to come up with ideas of what to plant.

http://www.amazon.com/National-Arboretum-Outstanding-Garden-Plants/dp/0671669575

If you are more interested in just selecting plants online, Monrovia has an excellent website that lets you narrow down plants by requirements.

http://www.monrovia.com/plant-catalog/

I guess it really depends. I would at least do a soil composition test to find out why grass there may have died. It could be bad soil (either chemically, or compositionally), or could have been just the wrong grass species/drought. So first step is to just gather information. You can buy soil test kits for like $10. They're a bit of a pain in the ass to do though. Alternatively, most local universities have programs that let you bring in soil samples for testing for free, and they can do that for you.

Chances are the soil is most likely fine, but could be too sandy.

Barring anything wrong with the soil's chemistry or composition, revitalizing the area is pretty easy:

If there are no significant weeds, take a steel rake and smash it into the ground, all over the area (including where there is grass). Just want to puncture it to aerate it. Cheap and fast to to do. For the bare area, you want to till it a bit to soften the soil, and remove any dead vegitation.

Apply some starter fertilizer and water it into the ground. May want to wait a couple of days after putting it down to let it absorb into the soil. Get fertilizer explicitly designed for new grass.

Next, grab some high quality top soil on a shovel, and start flicking it all over the area with your hand (including spots where there is grass. Don't cover that grass, but get some top soil in there. You may have to wait until the top soil has dried out so that you're not flicking clumps. Leave it in the wheel barrow outside in the sun and stir it up a bit to get it dry. When try, flick it all over the area. Try to get 1/2 inch or so. For the bare area, if you feel so inclined, put more top soil there and till it into the existing soil to keep it nice and loose and add more nutrients. Combined with the fertilized soil from earlier, this will help give the grass a good foundation to grow from.

Seed the area according to the recommendations on the bag (usually more heavily in the bare spots, and lighter in the parts with grass already). Then use the back of a light plastic leaf rake to GENTLY massage the seeds 1/4" into the soil. Some people stomp them into the soil, but that can compact the soil and make it hard for roots to grow deeper. It's ok for some seed to be showing on the surface, just try to make sure it has good soil contact (just not buried too deep in the soil).

Then just keep the top 1-2 inches moist (not standing water, just moist) throughout the day. There's no set watering frequency, just water as frequently as needed to keep it moist without being wet. As the grass starts growing taller, water it less frequently, but longer, getting that moisture layer deeper and deeper into the soil.

If you DO have a weed problem, you're going to want to nuke the area (grass and all) and till up the soil. Don't use extended control weed killer, just the 3 day stuff so that you can re-plant. I would personally wait a week or so just to be safe.

Either way, the key will be to seed the bare area, and overseed into the established area so that it blends in.

A helpful thing to do is get a straw germination blanket and put it over the area. This does a couple of things:

1. It helps the soil retain moisture better, leading to less frequent watering
   
2. It keeps birds away from the grass
   
3. It provides shade for the new sprouts so that harsh sun doesn't cook them before they have a chance to grow deeper roots.
   
   You may want to wait until fall at this point, as the cooler temperatures will be much more hospitable to the grass.

LMAO.

But for real, the foundation is the easy part. Look up local gardening centers, landscaping suppliers, stone yards, etc. to find stone. That looks like 3/8" pea gravel. If I had to guess, you need no more than 2 tons. Rule of thumb is that 1 ton covers 10x10ft 3 inches deep (find calculators online for better estimates).

Lay down landscaping fabric. Don't get the cheap stuff at Home Depot; get the quality woven stuff. Search for "geotextile fabric" on Amazon.

If you want a clean edge, go to Lowe's and get the Col-Met metal edging. They sell it in 8' lengths in black and it's relatively easy to install and gives a really, really clean edge. Pro-tip: use a reciprocating saw with a bi-metal blade to cut it for best results.

To get a perfect circle, place a stake at the center and tie a rope to it. Tie a spray can of marking paint to the other end and make yourself a perfect circle. Now trench it and add edging if you want that crisp look and low maintenance. Even though you already have a template to work from, I would still advise using this method of string and marking paint because it will be better to have a very well defined line to follow.

Get yourself a tamper or rent a compactor (if you're not in good shape and don't have good endurance, rent yourself a compactor). The dirt is probably already highly compacted from the pool so you will just need to add the stone on top and compact. If you need to level, you get yourself 3/4" diameter PVC pipes and lay that in your gravel bed and use a flat edge to level across the pipes. Then remove and compact.

I built a similar firepit using a kit with recycled granite and it looks awesome: https://www.buddingco.com/Recycled-Granite-Fire-Pit-Kit-p/fs-fire-pit-36.htm

The one I got was off of Etsy: https://www.etsy.com/listing/201454403/custom-granite-fire-pit?ref=shop_home_feat_1 (and holy shit, it was only $175 when I bought mine!)

Use heat-resistant adhesive when attaching the granite pieces together. I used this one: https://www.amazon.com/Rutland-Products-76C-500-Degree-10-3-Ounce/dp/B000DZBLNC because it's clear and if I made mistakes or used too much, you wouldn't see it leak out.

Here is a picture of my backyard after I put in the Col-Met edging and before I installed the plants and removed the grass.

Ntep.org recommends this.

https://unitedseeds.com/product/4th-millennium-tall-fescue/

Also, use this to prevent weeds for a few weeks

Scotts Turf Builder Starter Food for New Grass Plus Weed Preventer - 2-in-1 Formula - Fertilizes New Grass and Prevents Weeds like Crabgrass and Dandelions - Covers 5,000 sq. ft. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00B04KC4O/ref=cm_sw_r_other_apa_i_rSUKDbMZTT0TN

read this book https://www.amazon.com/Reimagining-California-Lawn-Water-conserving-Practices/dp/0978997123