Grass and weed Advice (Nashville)

[Raiderstudent]

Originally Posted by cittic10

100% correct.

Just as a side note about leyland cypress.
I don't have the deep hatred for those that many have but they're almost always planted for the same reason you planted yours. To screen the view of a neighbor's mess and to give more privacy. And they do that pretty effectively, at least until they get a disease and die. But the problem is they also draw attention to the fact that your neighbors are really close. So when your house is on the market and prospective buyers are looking out the window or in the yard, they can see an obvious attempt to screen something that they might not have noticed otherwise. But our first house is always a learning experience.

So going back to your lawn, it won't be long before you have a yard full of Bermudagrass. That will be the lawn, whether you want it to be or not. So if you're 100% set on moving, you can further encourage the bermuda by mowing short, mowing often and fertilizer, fertilizer, fertilizer. At least there will be grass there and it won't look as bad. It'll eventually choke out the fescue. Any fescue that manages to survive the convection oven we call summer can be sprayed with non-selective herbicide when the bermuda goes dormant.

I really appreciate your input. I can't agree more about the Cypress trees. I have always told myself I would buy a home with privacy and with a yard at least one acre, but right after the market crashed, I found a home with a selling price that I couldn't resist so I always knew it would be an investment property of sorts and not my life-long home (not that I'll make much on it now, but who could have told the future). I'm not a fan of siding on houses and the house behind mine has siding on the back which stares at me, so the cypress trees are to eliminate that eye-sore. I don't expect to live here for more than five years before I start looking at a home more long-term. It's funny because my parents have an older home with 1.5 acres and beautiful natural landscaping. I always took it for granted and didn't like the old home feel, but now it's growing on me and when I visit, their yard is practically laughing at me. Boy tastes change as you get older.

[cittic10]

There's nothing wrong with wanting to screen the view of your neighbors and their handywork.
But it's better accomplished, IMO, by a random planting of mixed species. It's also cheaper because it requires fewer plants. And, if one tree dies, nobody notices.

I spend a lot of time in the woods. It's always a lot more comfortable in the shade on a hot day. If you're like me and you like to use your deck or patio and sit outside and get some fresh air, it's a lot more enjoyable in the shade. It helps to keep your electric bills down. And with the privacy benefits, it's a lot more valuable than having an expansive lawn.

I still consider myself a lawn geek, but like any landscaping element, to be most effective, it's gotta be used the right way. That means an easily manageable and budget-friendly size with site appropriate grass type and all the necessary site work and tied in with other features of the landscape.