QuickTip: What should I do about that shady part of my Gainesville yard?

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Rusty Thompson on June 7th, 2018

Today I want to discuss a problem many Gainesville homeowners face in their lawn.

As we've brought up in several blogs, all you need for a fundamentally healthy lawn is the proper amount of the lawn's 3 basic needs: sun, water, and food (fertilizer.) If you have those three things, your grass will fill in by itself in time. If you don’t, it doesn’t matter how much time, effort, or money you throw at the problem, you will end up with that same bare spot under the tree.

Consider how much sun you need for grasses in Gainesville lawns:

  • St. Augustine needs about 5-6 hours to establish itself. Once established, the St. Augustine will gradually acclimate to less light (which explains why your neighbor may have thick St. Augustine under their trees and you don’t).
  • Zoysia is starting to become popular and has slightly higher light requirements than St.Augustine. We reommend 6 hours.
  • Bahia and Bermuda both need closer to 7-8 hours of sunlight
  • Centipede grass thrive in 5-6 hours of sunlight, similar to St. Augustine grass.

One solution to reducing shade on your lawn is trimming the tree's canopies, but this rarely increases the sunlight dramatically. How much it adds depends on your specific lawn and how low your limbs are hanging. 

If you have a shaded Gainesville lawn and have been fighting to keep grass, my solution is this: Embrace the shade. Why continue investing in sod that will never thrive? In my experience, fighting nature never results in a victory for me - trust me, I've tried.

There are simply too many appealing and low-maintenance plants that thrive in shade to keep fighting an uphill battle with grass. We can install low-maintenance shade plants, butterfly and hummingbird shade landscapes, and much more. It's just a matter of changing your perception that the shady area needs to be turf.

Even better than finally winning the war on having an attractive lawn, is Alachua County's Turf Swap Program. It will actually give you a rebate to do just that - trade in your struggling turf for Landscaping.  Click here to find out more.

If you have questions or concerns about your lawn, please don't hesitate to call us at (352)378-5296, fill out the form above, or email us at info@themasterslawncare.com. We would love to help. Your question may even be the next subject on our blog!

Tags:

Landscaping, lawn care