Lawns, Growth spirt?

It seems like this time of the year the lawns in Terre Haute generate a lot of hay, grows faster and gets away form home owners.

Not sure why, Could be some weed like crab grass or fescue. What ever it is, it has a fatter blade than regular grass, grows fast, and it generates a lot of hay.

If I generate any hay, I blow the grass in a windrow, let it dry for an hour to two, then use a lawn sweeper to pick up the hay. My hay is added to a mulch pile for next year's garden.

I raise my mower a little, less clippings. Those who think they need to cut grass an inch off the ground have yards that look like this. There are some yards that look worse.

What's your take on the annual growth spirt? What do you do with your hay?
geo.

Here in Iowa we call that "water grass". It is showing up alot here in my lawn right now. It will come this time of the year and soon it will turn into what we call "turkeys foot".

Sounds like crab grass, and its a bright green color.

Its been so dry and we did have a soaker last weekend, I still have not cut any grass on either lawn since mid June, normally I'll cut 15x a season + or -. Its just greening up a bit now, all of the lawns were brown/tan and the soil dry like baby powder.

I do the same thing, lay the cuttings in a swath, by going the opposite way on each pass, then let it dry until it's like hay you would bale. Sometimes the moisture is up because I'll collect it before the sun bleaches it too much. I use lumber wrappers as a tarp, (Tyvec like material)place the drying grass onto it and turn until dry enough to store. Its feed for the 2 pair of voles I keep as a hobby, and garden mulch. Depending on the weather, I can make a dark olive drab green hay, which seems to have lots of nitrogen for the garden and protein for those tiny little critters, they live on it and prosper.

Lawn sweeper makes it an easy task. Some cuttings I leave to help put something back into the soil. Some years the lawns do grow fast, you have to watch your cutting height because if you cut too low, it leaves a thick layer of cut grass and its over 16 loads with a 22 cu ft sweeper. It's kind of fun actually, because I use all of it somewhere for something.

cuby,
I think we are talking about the same grass or weed. Will Turkey's foot will it send up a shoot with seeds on it that look like a Turkey's foot?
geo

In SJ you can have the blue grass and the orchard grass go bonkers. If you get a couple of heavy rains you will need to mow it every week for several weeks in a row. Bale the "Hay". On the farm my sister thought it was the greatest thing to windrow the grass as she used the mower and then take over to feed all of the older calves in the box stalls. They sure thought it was a good idea TOO. One time my dad thought it would be a good idea to spread some fertilizer on the lawn so it would grow better. Yes he backed up the new Holland M***** spreader with a nice juicy fresh load into the yard and pulled the PTO. Did a real bangup job! About two weeks later after a good soaking rain things started to pop or is that poop out in the front yard. Me and my sister had to mow on about a three day cycle for over a month till things calmed down! Lawn looked as if it had been spray painted super dark green with a fire hose that summer!

Yes it will.

Well when August is here all the ryzones are gonna be pokin thru the surface, this is why Roundup works best this time of year on grasses. So this is most likely the growth spurt you're talking about. I've always noticed in late June the grass seems to cut harder too or not look as nice once cut like it does in early spring.

cuby,
I think you nailed it. Googled water grass pics. I think many yards in Terre Haute have it. Tons of hay being made, then tons of dead grass in yards.