Big Ole Pile of Stink Comin' at Ya

P U.

Yep. That's right. Had this big pile of compost delivered today and with the wind gusts going on I gotta tell you this stuff stinks. I'm sure those already annoyed neighbors are going to love it. Why did I have 8 cu yards of cow manure compost all good, ripened, and stankay delivered? Well, because I rotted in the box this weekend(remember shitty job) and that means one thing......I had a lot of time to think. And that time leads to me brewing a whole slew of good ideas.


So the front half of our yard before the creek is going to be grass. Right now its just a bunch of dirt and when it rains, it sucks. We decided we want most of it to be grass right now and then we can add on different landscaping as we go. But right now we figured grass, so at least when it rains it's not a mud pit for days.


We decided to get an estimate for irrigation and sod since that is the quickest and easiest way to get a yard STAT. The guy we have been using for landscaping sent us the estimate last week. $8,000!
Yeah I know. One more time.  $8,000 #!^%@C#^% dollars. Uh uh.


I was doing a little rotting and research and came upon a website talking about native lawns. It talked about how using native grass can save on water, fertilizing, and all the other annoying things you have to do to keep non-natives such as St. augustine and Bermuda grass alive. Well..........lightbulb. I ordered the seed on a whim ready to tackle the 6500 square feet of backyard. Besides, we realized we didn't want to consume so much water, have the upkeep of an irrigation system, and watch our water bill double per month.


Today was day one of getting the yard ready and it sucked. Bad. Have you ever tilled hard compact clay soil before? It stinks big time. And I wasn't tilling up a small space.This was the first step in preparing the yard and I realized halfway through that this was one of my good ideas gone bad again. Way to much for me to accomplish on my own. But I'm cheap (and hardheaded) and I didn't want to pay anyone to do it. Annoyed halfway through I pushed on in the heat with hallucinations of a tractor and landscape crew to help me. I finally got it done, my arms are still shaking and I'm as sore as an 80 year old in the morning but tomorrow, tag me in. Round 2.


Round two consists of raking and spreading that good compost all over the lawn. Then sowing the seeds. I'm trying to get it done before the real heat comes. It was 90 already today and this native seed don't do sizzlin.


I will let you know how it goes tomorrow and keep you updated on the grass situation as it plays out. If you are in Texas and want to check out Native lawns here are the links where I have been getting my info. Check it out.


http://www.seedsource.com/
http://www.wildflower.org/