by James Wall
Ok,
so some workers had ruined my nature strip at one end and replaced it with low grade dirt and thrown a bit of grass seed on the top. This was great news for the gang of pidgeons that live on the next door neighbours eaves and they spent the next 3 days frantically stuffing every single seed they could find into their gullets.
Well I could have just left this bare patch, but I thought I'd have a go at patching it up. Firstly I dug out about the equivalent of 2 potting mix bags of the low grade dirt and put that in another garden bed. Then I emptied out two 30 litre bags of Attunga Topsoil that comes with a wetting agent. This was then smoothed evenly, except where I had found the concrete cover to a Telstra pit - no wonder nothing had ever grown near that little bit !
Finally I was ready to plant the grass - The guys from One Stop Smart Water Solutions here at Gardenworld recommended that this time we plant from little plantlets or plugs called viro cells. Kikyku was the variety recommended for this nature strip and I got a tray of 100 plantlets, each one with multiple germinated grass seeds. The tray cost around $30.
To stop people walking over them, or putting the bins out on them, I had to erect some protection. I got some of the bent cane stakes from Gardman (how the hell do they bend these ! mmm maybe some sort of heat treatment) and then just weaved some gardeners plant twine through them. These stakes are cheap, and anchor each other better with both ends in the ground. They are also very safe, and prevent eyes from being poked out. They come in much bigger sizes and are excellent for tieing newly planted roses. For this project, the smaller ones were just fine, and nothing has knocked them over in the last 5 weeks.
After 3 or 4 weeks I was happy to see the little things jump away with an average of 5 litres a day. I haven't watered in a while now and will just see how they go. The tops will probably get a haircut with some scissors, and then lets hope they fill in the gaps. Looking back, I planted the plantlets much closer than advised on the label, but should have used the whole tray and planted them even closer - der !
So there you go, its not just seed or turf you can use to build a lawn - there is also viro cells available in a number of varieties that would be perfect for a smaller lawn, or a bigger budget.
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