Planting Grass on Sloped Yard

[DavidNPro]

Recently I acquired a piece of property by my house, and the time has come to plant grass on it. We had the lot partially ready to plant, raked and the like. However, we have had some very heavy rains over the past few days. Resulting in my nicely prepared lawn turning into a mess of ruts and rocks, as well as my attached driveway accumulating all the washed off dirt.

My question is, do you guys know of any secret to planting grass/holding topsoil in a position like this? It is not terribly steep, but steep enough. I could probably use hay bales or plastic to control the run off better so it does not all end up in my driveway, but this will still wash away the grass seed.

Has anyone ever used the mat they sell for planting new grass, at lowes or home depot? It seems awful expensive for the square footage, but does it even work?

Thanks for any input.

 

[Tomtint]

It does help, cost could easily be recovered if you have to grade,rake and reseed a couple times because of washout. Slopes are always tough, we have prepped the slope, hand seeded, hydro seeded and topped it with hand spread hay. It tends to make germination a bit faster.

 

[DavidNPro]

Do you recommend using hay over one of the erosion control type mats? The cost is not a problem if they actually work, was just looking for input before I spend 4 or 5 hundred on some mats to do the whole slope.

 

[Tomtint]

The erosion control mats help. So does the hay. If you seed and it rains before germination, the mat can handle average amounts of rainfall. If you get 3 days of 2" per hour rain.. Hay it and tarp it till the rain stops. This year, we have not just gotten rain....when it rains, it comes down in buckets with little warning.

 

[srossman]

One product that I've heard good things about is called PennMulch. It is made from recycle news paper I think and has starter fertilizer mixed in with it. I had a section of my yard do the same thing this spring where I reseeded the yard and after seeding and covering with straw, we had some hard rains which made a small stream flow through my yard. I'm going to try again this fall and this time use the pennmulch.

 

[Coyote machine]

You're better off waiting until fall to seed the slope. Hot weather and relentless rain are not conducive to good results. I'd put the mat money into having a pro hydro-seed it for you with a guarantee of good results. Or for what you would throw away on mats, consider sod installed professionally- it might not be so bad in cost when you consider you've already spent time and money and it washed away. Sod is unlikely to wash away and will give excellent results...

 

[DavidNPro]

All of this input is good, thanks.

Fortunately I did not have any seed down, and I have been preparing the ground myself so its just slave labor at this point that is lost.

It has been pretty cool around here lately so the grass in some patches is growing in a different area away from the slope, it just the washing away that is killing it pretty much.

Also, I have heard about those products like PennMulch, do you have a source for that?