5 years ago we bought a house in Bastrop county, outside of Austin and installed toro zoyzia (sp??) sod and 3 truck loads of dirt.
I have pictures which, are a bit too large to upload. I can email them to you if they will help you to help me.
The pictures show the sod after it's gotten set in and growing. We added the sod and dirt in the back.
Some of the shots show open areas of dirt. That is what we started with (and have again). The areas of natural grass look about as good, for the most part as the sod. However, you can see a curved line where the sod and existing grass meet. The zoyzia definitely looks better.
It looked great and after a month of watering (and $$$) the sod did quite well until the drought.
As long as we received rain once in a while or we watered once in a while the lawn was ok. Well, the sky quit raining and I could not afford to water any more. Besides, I was frustrated the natural grass was not thriving, but was still living.
So, now that we've received rain since August and hope for more I have some questions:
1. Who can I take a sample of my crummy, rock filled soil for analysis. I need to know if I can do anything to/for the soil that won't break the bank. Or, should I just bring in more topsoil and start over.
2. Should I forget sod and try to improve the natural, existing grass ???
3. I have absolutely zero experience with organic. I've heard the DD mention cost. So, how much $$ should I expect to spend for 1 acre minus the house and some trees (about 30,000 square feet of lawn)?
4. And the dog...... Is any of this organic stuff going to kill or injure the dog? I know he's going to do due diligence killing anything along the fence. But I don't really want him to be hurt with whatever organic stuff I end up using.
Thanks in advance for the help. I guess I'll need to ask the same questions in a tree forum. We've lost several 40+ foot hight cedars and oaks in addition to the zoyzia lawn.