I bet the warmer winter (no freezes for us in the north valley) will promote early bermuda growth. I think it would be good to switch back to Bermuda watering now… your rye will still get water, but not enough for it to keep surviving/thriving, and your bermuda will start gettin the appropriate amount of water. In previous years, I did not change my watering habits soon enough and I was left with a lot of dead spots for a month
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@Modawg2k When you switch to bermuda watering, do you just change all your zone settings for your lawn over? I’m curious about the changes you make 
I think this will be my game plan:
- AW stays the same obviously since the soil doesn’t change
- Root Depth: I have my winter rye at 6", but had bermuda last year at 9", so I’m thinking of changing my root setting to either 8 or 9. This will provide good watering for the bermuda below and stress out the rye.
- Allowed Depletion: I used the default 50% last summer, but dropped it down a bit with the winter, so I will be putting that back at 50%.
- Crop Coefficient: This is the thing I dialed back the most. Default is 70, which watered the grass way too much IMO. I was sitting at 35% all winter and my grass looked great. I will put this back to the default 65% which I had success with last summer.
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I switched two of my to zones over to warm season. These zones were already seeing rapid bermuda growth, so I figured it was time. Went ahead and set all the advanced features back to default for now and I will fine tune over the next couple weeks. Immediately watering frequency reduced.
I’m not sure I will hold out on the other zones much longer. Now that daytime temps are well into the high 80’s/low 90’s, Rachio is wanting to water the cool season grass every day of the week for shorter periods of time. It still doesn’t think it is “filling up the bucket” since I don’t allow watering on the weekends (that’s when I usually mow). Surprisingly the ground isn’t overly saturated, but I don’t think it is optimal considering that the rye should start dying off around now.
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IMO, letting those upper few inches dry out, along with our high temps, will help to kill off any weeds that tend to pop up in late spring
This is true. In the other areas where I still have awesome rye growth, I have let it grow longer (against every type A nerve in my body) with the hopes that it, combined with the warmer weather will help to kill out the rye and any stray clover that has made its way into the yard.
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Overseeding of cool season grasses in warm season turf is no longer allowed in most of the cities in the Dallas metroplex. This practice wastes water, stresses the bermudagrass and is time consuming. If you live in the desert, reconsider this practice.
If you have clover in your yard this is usually a sign of soil compaction and low soil fertility. Kill it out with a post emergent herbicide for clover. Aerate your yard. Get a soil test to see what your soil needs. Dandelions and poa annua are other weeds that signify soil compaction.
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@robertokc No doubt that my soil is compacted. I haven’t done it since I moved in a few years ago, and I highly doubt the previous owner did either…Besides the sprinklers, I also have flood irrigation in the front yard of my house, which I’m sure really progresses the compaction. I have thrown down a post emergent and am looking to arate. What type do you recommend? Spike or core? I know core is better for clay soils, and spike for loamy soils. My area is in the sandy loam range, so should I stick with a spike?
Also, when is the best time to aerate? Should I wait until the bermuda has taken a better hold?
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Are you in Phoenix? Its the only place I know with flood irrigation. This is a good time to aerate. I have never seen spike aeration. Go with the standard in your area. But i dont think you can go wrong with core aeration. As far as a product, look for a liquid spray product that is specifically for clover and oxalis. Nothing can beat a soil test through your county extension office.
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Hi friends 
Creating a schedule for new seeding is now so easy with the Rachio app! Check out this article for more info.
-Lo 
Problem I see with this is that ideally you don’t need or want to water at night. A late afternoon/early evening watering is more than enough to keep things happy overnight. It’s a start, but it would be nice to add in interval in daylight hours…
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What about having the option to end at sunset think will be ideal.
I agree on all points. It’s nice to see the feature introduced for sure, but I probably wouldn’t use it until night times were excluded.
@azdavidr @tmcgahey Not that this has to do with seeding, but how do you guys feel about bermuda being watered in the summer around 2am or so? I set all 3 of my schedules (2 drips, 1 grass) to run before sunrise, but it keeps watering the grass first. I’ve let it go so far but is that time of night still bad for when we have higher night temps? I’ve always been anti overnight watering but decided to let this “before sunrise” thing play out for a bit.
I have the same concerns @Modawg2k. That’s why I’ve held off on the water before sunrise feature. I’m afraid to mess with what’s been working well for me.
I’ve been doing before sunrise for a while now without issues. My run times are so long though that the drip and grass are competing for time and it doesn’t always end up at night.
Can you elaborate? I think my drip run times are even longer than yours.
My grass. I have Hunter MP Rotators so my zones run for 1h30m to put down the 1" of water Rachio wants. I really need to dig up and recipe the zones to combine them. It was originally designed for spray nozzles and the math says I can co.bine up to 3 zones in 1.
With 8 zones running 1h30m, it takes up a lot of time, so when it runs on the same day as the drip, it ends up getting pushed.
I just noticed I’m putting down 0.42". I’m at a 7" root depth working my way up to 9". The weird thing is I changed the root depth to 9" and it still says flex is putting down 0.42". Did the update happen later? I’m using an AW of 0.12. What are you using? I’m just trying to figure out why Flex is putting down less than I’d expect. Thanks.