Dwarf Lawn Grass Needs Cutting Only Once A Month

Press, Volume XCIV, Issue 28161, 27 December 1956, Page 6

Dwarf Lawn Grass Needs Cutting Only Once A Month

A new kind of grass for lawns, which does not need cutting more than once a month, and is so strong as to choke out of a lawn all other kinds of grass and other unwanted plant growth, has been ! developed in the United States. The grass is a special strain •'called ZlO3 by the American Horticultural Institute, which developed it) of Agrostis stolonifera. better known as creeping bent. In England, creeping bent isi sometimes considered a form of I twitch, although it grows en-! , tirely on the surface of the ground ’ and its roots run just below it. Several varieties of Agrostis stolonifera are listed in standard Works on British grasses, and it is found throughout the world in one form or another. All the : varieties have a somewhat similar i root system, but some have rather [longer leaves, or many differ in some other respect from the new ZlO3 strain. [ The new grass grows very 1 thickly, the long creeping stems and short leaves forming an intense mat, an inch thick. BeI cause the grass grows along the ground this way, it needs very little cutting and is claimed to be excellent for lawns. It has the advantage of covering stony ground with its springy mat of growth, and will thrive under trees and bushes where other grasses will not grow. Experiments show that. if planted in pieces an inch square ' and a foot apart, the grass covers i the area in three months. The ;

stems soon thicken, and with further thickening, the blades become shorter. Within one season, a very good lawn is made, much superior to one obtained by sowing seed. By the end of the second season, all foreign weeds and grasses are choked out. Thus a lawn of tough, springy sward, brilliantly green, may be formed in less than two seasons. It has been found that existing lawns can be entirely remade by pushing small plugs of the new grass into the soil among the other grasses. Transfer to England A Danish horticulturist visiting the American institute which; developed the new grass obtained less than one square yard of it.( and took it back to Denmark. Within three years, this small piece had grown to 600 square yards. From Denmark, the grass was taken to England. Getting it into England was difficult. The Danish authorities passed it as fit for export, but the British customs officials had doubts about it. It was four weeks before the grass cleared the Customs—i and then a dock strike almost: pevented it from being collected.; By the time the crates containing it were opened, the grass looked like slimy, brown coconut matting. But it showed its constitutional strength in that, within three months, the 600 square yards of grass was in good enough condition to be split up and planted over an area of 2000 square yards.