Seed or not?

[blue_healer_guy]

Is it to late to throw done an area of 50'x20' with new seed? If so I would assume you wouldnt want it to sprout and then get it killed by a frost. My dad always had good luck putting it down in late Nov and would come up great first thing in the spring. I have a 20 pound bag already, if I shouldn't put it down, how do I store this for in the spring. Thanks.

[crothmeier]

i would think its too late. i have my bag of leftover seed wrapped up and in a cool dry place.

[LwnmwnMan2]

It would work for late November, as the seed woud probably be covered by a snow.

Then when the snow melts in the spring, not only will you have high moisture in the soil, the snow will help psuh the seed into the top 1/2 of the soil.

Your assumptions about not wanting to do it now are correct. The last thing you would want would be for the grass to start to germinate, and the be damaged by the frost / freeze.

Either wait to do a dormant seeding, or put the seed in a cool dry place until spring.

[blue_healer_guy]

THANKS FOR THE REPLYS.

[Phred52]

mjgrose, I just (11 days ago)put seed down (I use "tall fescue" seed not a mix) I generously watered it and covered it with black plastic. If you're RE-planting okay, DON'T use this info for over-seeding, the plastic will kill the grass you now have. Covered by the plastic, it took 4 days and the grass was over 1" tall!! I beat the first frost by 2 days. I have some areas that I was going to overseed, after seeing that, I'll wait til spring, till the area over and totally re-seed. Phred52

[Quetico]

Whatever you do with new lawns at this time of the year use some sort of erosion control. The heavy fall rains and spring rains plus melt run off will wash away the soil and seed. Erosion control blankets are far cheaper than need seed and regrading. Its also the environmentally conscious thing to do.

[MuleShack]

Fescues tend to germinate a lot faster...generally 7 days in the summer and fall months. Blue grass seed can take up to 3 weeks to germinate depending on variety and mix. I would wait until the end of this week after this round of rain and then seed the area and cover for erosion. Then it should come up strong in the spring.

I seeded about 3/4 acre of my back yard 2 years ago with a premium blue grass seed. I graded and then spread the seed in the last week October, spread a good dose of starter fertilizer and then covered with erosion mats. By April most of it was popping green already.