Repairing Your Drought Ravaged St. Augustine Lawn on a Budget

Well the rainy season has finally begun in earnest in Florida and hopefully the fears of a prolonged drought will come to an end. If you were an upright citizen and respected the one day a week watering restrictions that were put into place (and are still in force in many areas) then your St. Augustine lawn probably looks like the example below, mostly green with some brown patches.

My wife, like most people in Florida I think, presumed that I would be able to go over to the local big box garden center and purchase a bag of grass seed to throw down to fill-in the brown spots. But au contraire! The reason is that the St. Augustine turf grown in Florida was discovered around the Cape of Good Hope (South Africa) in 1791 and since the 1890’s has been the predominant strain planted for Florida lawns. Unfortunately that strain is a sterile triploid variant with purple-colored stigmas that does not set fertile seeds (image of the seed head below with zoomed inset).

Since St. Augustine grass has been propagated vegetatively (stolons, plugs or sod) for 200 years, only a few strains or varieties have evolved and none have been developed through grass breeding programs. Apparently when attempting to cross a fertile diploid St. Augustine turf with a sterile triploid variant, fertile seeds will not be produced. Although some St. Augustine grass strains can be established from seed by planting at 1/3 to 1/2 pound per 1,000 square feet. The rate of establishment from seed planted at that rate is about the same as for 2 inch sod plugs planted on 1 foot spacing. So why bother with questionable seeds when planting stolons, plugs or sod are more productive ways to establish a St. Augustine lawn? That is why you do not find St. Augustine grass seed.

Well, as you now understand St. Augustine grass seeds are out of the question so do you want to spend your hard-earned money on plugs or sod when you most likely have plenty of potential sprigs (aka stolons or runners) in your yard? Nah, I didn’t think so. Here is how to go about sprigging St. Augustine grass into those bare spots in your turf.

Sprigs (cut from runners aka stolons) are stems of grass with some young roots, but no soil attached. To put in St. Augustine grass sprigs, prepare the soil just like you would if you were going to plant seeds.

Next, walk around your yard and look for grass runners like those pictured below. Look for the longer ones perhaps growing up or between fences, creeping over stepping stones or onto the sidewalk, or even in that flower bed you have been delaying weeding.

When you have found your first stolon, turn it over and look at the joints or nodules on the grass stem. In most cases you will see roots sprouting out. Cut the runner as far back into the turf as possible without having to yank out a hunk of turf and roots attached to it to cut it.

First, get your dibbler. You have a dibbler right? You do not know what a dibbler is do you? Well, you can buy one at the garden center or you can carve your own from a stick or dowel. Basically carve one end of an 18” long dowel into about a 1” long graduated point. Do not go too thin as you are going to use the pointy end to dibble a 1” to 2” deep hole in the ground to plant your sprigs into.

To turn the stolon or runner into a sprig, flip it over and look for the new roots at the nodes or joints of the grass stem (images above). You will want to cut below the node so that you have about 1” of stem with roots on the bottom and 1” of stem with leaves on top. Strip any leaves between the two ends to just below where your top leaves are. There is your sprig – all prepared to plant.

Now take your dibbler and make a hole in the ground for your prepared sprigs. The hole should be at least 1” deep (and a little deeper or wider to accommodate your sprig’s stem and roots). Plant your sprig in the hole, make sure all the roots are in the soil and tamp the soil down around the sprig. That is all there is to sprigging St. Augustine grass.

The next time you dibble take a moment to notice what the soil is like in and around the hole. It should be somewhat moist and hold together, not run apart like dry beach sand. If your soil is not clumpy and moist you may need to irrigate your new plantings. Hopefully you are getting enough precipitation from the fairly regular summer showers that additional irrigation is not required.

So, there you go -- a lesson on how to sprig the bare spots in your St. Augustine lawn for nothing more than materials found around your house.