When to seed your lawn in Kansas City
If you ask us when to seed your lawn, our answer is almost always the same: fall. Kansas City lawns are mostly cool-season grasses like tall fescue and Kentucky bluegrass, and they grow best when the days are warm, the nights are cool and the summer heat is behind them.
The best time: September
K-State Research and Extension calls September the best month to seed or overseed a cool-season lawn in Kansas City. The soil is still warm enough for seed to sprout quickly, and new grass has the whole fall and the following spring to grow strong roots before it faces another Kansas City summer.
The deadline: October 15
You can still plant tall fescue into early and mid-October, but October 15 is generally considered the last safe day to seed in the fall. After that, young grass may not grow enough roots to make it through the winter, and late plantings fail more often.
What about spring?
Spring seeding can work, especially for patching bare spots, but it's harder. New grass has only a few months to get established before the heat arrives, and it has to compete with crabgrass and other weeds that sprout at the same time. If you seed in spring, do it as early as you can, usually March into April, and plan to water through the summer.
Which grass seed for Kansas City?
Tall fescue is the workhorse for Kansas City yards. It handles our heat, our clay soil and our up-and-down winters better than most grasses. A blend with some Kentucky bluegrass can help a sunny lawn fill in bare spots on its own. Here's how we usually point people:
- Full sun: Dynagreen Sun Mix or 5-Way and Blue
- Shade: Shady Premium Mix
- Kids, dogs and high traffic: Sports Utility Mix
- Big areas on a budget: Kentucky 31 Tall Fescue
- Quick, temporary cover: Annual Ryegrass
Give new seed a good start
- Mow your existing lawn short and rake out dead grass so seed can reach the soil.
- Core aerate or rough up bare spots so the seed has good contact with the soil.
- Water lightly and often. Keep the soil moist but not soggy until the seedlings are up, which may mean watering more than once a day when it's hot.
- Once the new grass is growing, cut back to a deep watering about once a week if it doesn't rain.
- Feed it. K-State recommends fertilizing cool-season lawns in September and again in November.
Not sure what your yard needs? Bring us a description of the spot, how much sun it gets and how it's used, and we'll help you pick the right seed. You can find all our grass seed on our Lawn & Garden page.
