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Please refer to the letter from Down To Earth regarding drought conditions directly below this section

Many of you have shared your recent frustration (by logging work orders) at seeing increasing brown / dry / dead spots developing in your St Augustine lawns believing there is an issue with irrigation or some type of insect infestation. The lawn stress areas you’re seeing are primarily due to a simple lack of water…not because the system isn’t operating correctly or because of chinch bugs or grub worms.

It’s important to understand, our irrigation system is centrally controlled and that DOWN TO EARTH has ZERO control on how many days a week we receive irrigation and for how long each irrigation cycle lasts.

Currently, we are scheduled to receive irrigation cycles 2X a week (Monday and Thursday) for a max 15-19 mins (contingent upon a number of factors like water table levels, moisture measured in the soil, and rainfall). DVI (the company who oversees and manages the overall Kings Ridge irrigation system infrastructure)…commented in a recent meeting…they are under constant pressure by the county to conserve water by limiting irrigation cycle-times.

It’s also important to understand St Augustine turf grass is not drought tolerant. It requires regular deep watering (at least 20-30 mins 2-3X a week in hot weather) to maintain a healthy green appearance. Therefore, supplemental watering by the homeowner is recommended.

Another challenge is being adjacent to the golf course where Bermuda grass is resident…Bermuda (which is more drought tolerant than St Augustine) quickly spreads in hot dry conditions and will naturally creep in and take hold in a St Augustine lawn…especially when the St Augustine turf grass is starting to stress and begins thinning…ultimately choking the St Augustine out and taking over.

Weed herbicides DO NOT work to clear out Bermuda…because both Bermuda and St Augustine are “grasses”…these grasses don’t coexist very well…because to maintain Bermuda…it needs to be mowed at around 1-2” tall (see the golf course fairways and rough areas). St Augustine on the other hand is maintained / mowed between 4-5” tall…so when our St Augustine lawns are mowed at this higher height…the underlying Bermuda that’s found it’s way in…grows taller as it quickly spreads looking unkempt and “wispy”…it’s a completely different texture of turf grass…there are many lawns throughout Kings Ridge with increasingly large patches of Bermuda grass.

While there is a new product that “claims” to kill Bermuda but not St Augustine (which DTE is going to start to use)…there is no guarantee it will effectively or fully rid lawns of Bermuda grass…the only effective way to fully get rid of Bermuda in your lawn is to kill it…spray it with a grass killer (while it’s actively growing during hot weather because it has a very deep taproot)…once dead…the area / dead material can then be raked out…the area should be prepared by adding topsoil and then new St Augustine sod installed and thoroughly watered in until it takes root. This mitigation effort (while effective) would be at the homeowner’s expense.

I trust this information is helpful in understanding the challenge we all face with increasing irrigation water restrictions being placed on all communities throughout central Florida.

Devonshire Board