How is one grass seed different from another?

Not all grass seeds are created equal.  I think that the best way to grasp the subject of seed selection is to put it into human terms.  If you are looking for a person to play defensive end for the New England Patriots, you are not likely to find that person in the jockey’s locker room at Churchill Downs, and vice versa.  Grasses are the same.  You need to find a grass that is suited to the purpose for which it is intended.

So, what then are we looking for when selecting a grass seed that is both suitable and satisfactory for the home lawn setting?  We seek a grass that, when mature, will thrive in the environment that in which it is sowed and do so in a manner that is pleasing to the eye.

There are many different environments that exist within a single lawn.  Some areas are in full sun, some in full shade, others a combination of the two.  Then there may be differences in the types of soil the grasses are growing in and how much water and nutrients those soils can hold.

To that end, we carefully select the components of our grass seed such that when we plant it, it has the very best chance of succeeding regardless of what the environment is at any one location in your lawn.

Grass seed in the Northeast United States blended for use on home lawns contains three different species: Kentucky Bluegrass, Fine Leaf Fescue and Perennial Ryegrass.

The ryegrass will germinate first and provide satisfactory cover on bare soil preventing erosion.  The better cultivars of rye are a handsome, dark green with a shiny appearance.  Contrary to their name, Perennial Ryegrasses aren’t all that perennial.  Lawns established for a few years have little of the original ryegrass remaining in them.  That isn’t problematic, that’s what’s supposed to happen.  They did their job and retired.

The Fine Leaf Fescues will predominate in areas of low sunlight and low maintenance.  That’s not to say you won’t find them in full sun, my front lawn is almost exclusively fescue, but since the ryes and blues cannot compete with the fescues in the shade, they predominate.

Kentucky Bluegrass is the turf with which we are most familiar.  It is the grass of which sod is composed.  It will do best in full sun with moderate to high maintenance.  There are great differences in the characteristics of the various cultivars available to us.  Some have excellent, deep green color, but have poor resistance to disease.  Some cultivars are exactly the opposite – the color is not pleasing to the eye but they are otherwise rather resistant to disease.

That’s where research becomes very important.  In selecting the best grass seed for use in your lawn, we rely upon something called the National Turfgrass Evaluation Program, or NTEP, for data that will point us in the right direction.

Locally, researchers at the University of Massachusetts and the University of Rhode Island plant various cultivars of different species of grasses, subject them to a management regime over the course of a few years and evaluate the performance of each of the participating grasses.  When aggregated, we can look to see which cultivars of grass performed best under conditions that would be analogous to those found on home lawns.  Some of these cultivars become quite famous in the turf world and are immediately recognizable.  Midnight Kentucky Bluegrass and Jamestown Chewings Fescue come to mind immediately.