Fertilize around May 15th, Sept 1st, and Oct 15th. I have no issues with synthetic. I do however believe in feeding microbes and building organic matter and I think you can do that just fine with mulch mowing. If you want, throw some soybean meal down twice a year, that's fine at 20 lbs per 1,000 sq ft. You can use P free fertilizer. I really wish I knew what your Iron (Fe) and Salts were. I sent you an email about the lab I use that gives more complete report for $26. For synthetic, let's say Scott's I'd use Scotts with 2% Iron in both May and Sept. Then Winterizer in Oct. Phos free is fine.

Hi Lisa, You have high sulfur which would normally give you a low pH but extraordinarily high calcium, which gives you the high pH. That's classic Texas soil. Growing grass with proper watering and mowing is the best thing you can do for it. Stopping the chemicals and applying compost is second best. Applying organic fertilizer for the bermuda and no fertilizer for the Tech Turf comes last. One thought to keep in mind is that wherever you plant trees, the Tech Turf (the new name for Turffalo grass) will not grow on the east, north, or west sides of the trees, fences, shrubs, or brick mailboxes. The best way to nudge the soil pH is with cottonseed meal. Ask around at your local feed stores to see where to get it. You might have to work up a deal with a feed lot. Or you might visit some cotton gins and see if you can bag your own. Why do you think your soil is clay? If it drains well and has nearly no organic matter, it must have a bit of sand. Dump a couple cups of soil into a quart jar of water and see what happens. Anything that settles to the bottom quickly after shaking the jar is sand. Clay will stay in suspension for a long time. Loam will settle on top of the clay over a few hours/days. The organic matter floats. What loosens the soil is fungi. Compost brings them in if you have none at all. I'm not familiar with expanded shale but it sounds like one of Howard Garrett's ideas. Unless he can explain how shale somehow grows fungi, I would focus on proper watering (deep and infrequent) and mowing (lowest setting for bermuda) with frequent cottonseed fertilizer until you make the change in grass. I have seen Tech Turf mowed at every height from 3/4 to 4 inches, and it all looks amazingly good...unless it is in any shade. Then it becomes a bare spot. Even bermuda does better with shade than Tech Turf. Why are you waiting until fall to convert? The Tech Turf may go dormant before you get complete coverage and good roots. I would convert ASAP and take advantage of the heat. If you are going to change to Tech Turf now, then you can skip the fertilizing and ignore the shortcomings of organic matter. Buffalo grass grows along side the highways where the soil is very poor.

Do the test. Small price to pay to keep the risk with the seller in case soil remediation is needed! Someone else might charge less, or maybe there is a smaller panel of tests that would be sufficient--although I expect here much of the cost is for obtaining the sample(s) since there is no open hole. Right now you know nothing about that old tank and its removal. I know people who have paid tens of thousands of dollars doing cleanup. And if I were purchasing, I would want the seller to hire a qualified professional to remove the other pipe remnants prior to closing, or include it with your testing from the same removal company. Obtain and keep all documents related to removal and testing, especially if not on file with a state or local agency. Future regulations--when you sell--would be more, not less, rigorous. I'm not trying to scare you too much, just enough to get the test and all documentation. When I bought my house and farm it had an underground gasoline storage tank which I asked the seller to remove, and part of that was a soil test. I was very reasonable and restrained in terms of other requests, but this was very important. Separately, I paid out-of-pocket for a well water test to include certain gasoline-related chemicals. All clear, all on file, all in the past.

Becky, thank you for taking the time to make some suggestions. This is all great advice and I'm already looking at how to tackle this with the rest of the summer ahead of me. I cannot say for certain about the clay content, but our area contains thick red dirt, rocks and other material so assumed clay. I appreciate your thoughts about holding off on Milorganite now if brown patch is a problem, as I have had to fight some dollar spot in the past. So no Nitrogen now? I am sure the picture is hard to show, but the yard is more yellow than green. I'm just worried about a summer that 'burns' the grass since it is not thick at all and very exposed (we have hot and humid summers). I've spent a bit of time researching your recommendations and am thinking the following: - Apply some baby shampoo (may try this weekend yet) - Put down 11 lb/k of gypsum (will likely tackle this next weekend) - SOP two weeks later, then again in August, Sept and October? Or only three applications total? - Milorganite in August and again in September - Early fall - overseed - November - fast release nitrogen fertilizer What about the K20? (Sorry my research isn't helping me out there). Thoughts? Is this the better plan than your first recommendation of a balanced 10-10-10 now and another later in the summer? Thank you very much again, Don