Wet Summer Has Turf Farmers Seeing Green

Thanks to the return of monsoon weather and cool temperatures, almost everybody's lawn is turning green instead of brown this summer. The grass is growing so fast turf farmers are having trouble keeping up with mowing it.
The long-awaited moisture is translating into a better outlook for homeowners and local parks as well as a welcome normal year for those in the turf-farming and lawn-seeding business.

The precipitation total in Castle Rock so far this year is about 13 inches, according to the National Weather Service Cooperative Observers Program and the town.

In July, alone, it rained 2.87 inches as measured in Centennial Park and nearly 2 inches in Founders Village, said Curt Williams, superintendent of park maintenance for Castle Rock. It also rained nearly 4 inches in June, according to the Weather Service.

In 2003, the total was 14 inches through July, but 7 inches of that arrived in March, leaving the other months relatively dry. In 2002, the year of the Hayman fire and the worst year of the drought, the moisture total was only 6.6 inches through July.

Williams said the grass in local parks has never looked better.
"Everywhere it is unbelievable," Williams said. "I've never seen South Street Elementary look so good."

At the same time, the town is saving water because the weather has been so consistently moist and cool.

"In Founders Village, for instance, there were at least 15 days this month we were able to shut down [sprinklers] because of rainfall of .15 inch or more," Williams said.

The town adjusts the amount of irrigation water it uses to match the overall evaporation rate on a daily basis, Williams said.

The weather has been a bonanza for Troy Bacon, owner of A1 Affordable Hydroseed of Castle Rock. Bacon said sales were up 40 percent compared to a year ago and he has hired two more people. Bacon estimates the rainfall is three times as much as fell on the area last year.

Asked to rate the weather in terms of grass-growing potential, Bacon said, "This has been a 10. It's the best weather you can ask for. It's been partly sunny during the day. It's been cool so the ground stays wetter longer. Germination takes place a lot faster. It's great because we are making a lot more money."

Bacon specializes in hydroseeding, which entails spraying a slurry of seed, water, fertilizer and water-retaining crystals called copolymers. Hydroseeding is used as a cheaper alternative to installing sod.

It costs 7 to 10 cents per square foot including installation, compared to 20 to 60 cents for sod. A typical lawn costs only $200 to $300 to hydroseed, Bacon said.
"[The weather] has really helped the native grass and wildflower installations," Bacon said. "Oddly enough business started picking up at the end of June and was good all the way through July," Bacon said. Typically, the slowest time for hydroseeding is spring and fall, not summer.

People mistakenly believe it takes more water to grow a lawn from seed than sod, Bacon said. "With seed you are watering more often for less time - 3 to 4 times a day for 5 to 7 minutes, compared to twice a day for 30 minutes."
Sod is better for certain applications.

"For a really small area, or if there are dogs you can't keep off, then we recommend sod," Bacon said.

The weather is so conducive to vegetation that Green Valley Turf Co. of Littleton planted 600 acres of sod, compared to only 300 last year. The main problem this year is the grass is growing too fast, Wilkins said. "We've had a terrible time keeping up with mowing. It rains and then you can't mow and it grows some more."

Green Valley Turf Co. recently completed a project at Douglas County High School.

Green Valley started getting busier last fall when the watering restrictions in Denver were lifted, Wilkins said.

Activity has picked up compared to last year at this time.

"Last year was slow until the fall, then we had one of the biggest falls ever ... I'd say we're having a normal summer," Wilkins said.

Compared to previous years, Wilkins is selling more buffalo grass, a drought-tolerant alternative to Kentucky bluegrass. Buffalo grass, which uses 80 percent less water than bluegrass, costs about twice as much to install, Wilkins said. It also is brown half of the year. "If you want to see green, it's not good."

It also is more labor intensive because it does not grow from seed, but in clumps, like individual plants.

Despite what some authorities say, bluegrass is very resilient.

"If bluegrass weren't so drought tolerant, we would be busier," Wilkins said. "We have a good year and - bam - it's back. For a lot of applications it's hard to beat."