Hydroseeding in Los Angeles, CA

Hydroseeding in Los Angeles is a race against two things: dry heat and the first big storm. Our trucks spray a mix of seed, wood or paper fiber, fertilizer and a tackifier glue onto soil that has already been prepped, and that fiber layer pins the seed down and keeps it moist until it sprouts. Homeowners call us for new lawns and lawn renovation, builders call for graded pads and slopes, and hillside owners call when bare ground needs cover before the rainy season. Our hydroseeding services cover all of it, from a small backyard to several acres of disturbed ground.

Semi-arid on paper, flood-prone in practice

Wikipedia's climate summary classes Los Angeles as semi-arid, close to the line of a Mediterranean climate, with only about 35 days of measurable precipitation in an average year. Summer is usually rainless. The catch is that average years are rare. A string of dry years with 5 to 10 inches is often followed by one or two wet years above 20 inches, and a series of rainy days can flood the lowlands and send mud down hills, especially after wildfire has stripped them. Seed and erosion control plans here have to work in both kinds of year.

Sandy valley ground

Much of the San Fernando Valley and the coastal plain sits on alluvial fans built from granitic rock. The USDA's official description of the Tujunga series, a soil first established in Los Angeles County, calls it very deep and somewhat excessively drained, with high saturated hydraulic conductivity. In plain terms, water goes straight through it. The same description notes the soil usually wets below about 30 centimeters sometime between October and December and stays moist at depth until April or May. That is the natural planting window, and it is why we pay for fiber mulch on sandy lots: the mulch layer holds water at the seed between sprinkler cycles.

Hydroseed, sod or dry seed?

Rolled-out sod looks finished by evening, but it is the priciest route to a lawn, and on a sunny Valley lot it needs heavy watering until the roots knit into the soil. Dry seed spread by hand or a broadcast spreader costs the least, but seed sitting on bare sandy soil dries out, blows around in a Santa Ana wind and gets eaten by birds. Hydroseed lands in between on price. The University of Nebraska Extension describes hydro-seeding as somewhat pricier than dry seeding and usually cheaper than sod. Its advantage is the mulch blanket, which matters more in a dry city than in a wet one. In good conditions, the first green from a hydroseeded yard tends to appear within 5 to 7 days, and most lawns are ready for the first mowing in 4 to 6 weeks.

When to seed for each kind of grass

Most lawns in the city are either cool-season tall fescue blends or warm-season grasses like bermudagrass. For fescue, we aim for fall. Autumn heat waves in September and October are common here, so we usually wait for that heat to break and spray in late October or November, ahead of the winter rains. Warm-season grasses need warm soil and go in from late spring into early summer, typically May and June, and they depend on irrigation because summer rain will not come. Near the coast, early-summer marine fog slows drying, which helps fescue and holds back bermuda. In the warmer valleys, freezing nights happen almost every winter, so a warm-season lawn goes brown and dormant for part of the year. We will tell you which grass suits your yard before we fill the tank.

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Hillsides and the rainy season

The Los Angeles Building Code declares October 1 through April 15 the rainy season. During those months, grading over 200 cubic yards on a permitted site cannot start until an erosion control system is approved, and hillside owners with unfinished grading over that size must file erosion control plans with their grading inspector before October 1. The code also requires cut and fill slopes in designated hillside areas to be planted and irrigated to grow ground cover. Slopes under 15 feet tall need grass or ground cover plus irrigation, and taller slopes also need shrubs or trees on a set spacing. Sprinklers on those slopes must apply no more than 3/10 inch of water per hour. To get a slope covered and growing within those rules, we rely on hydromulch, a bonded fiber matrix spray or rolled erosion control blankets, depending on the grade.

Mud, storm drains and the state permit

The State Water Resources Control Board regulates stormwater from construction sites. A project that opens up an acre or more of soil needs coverage under the state's Construction Stormwater General Permit, and so does a smaller parcel when it falls within a bigger development that crosses the acre mark as a whole. Even on a small remodel, city code says no excavation or fill may let soil or debris slide or flow onto neighboring property. Silt fence, fiber rolls and inlet protection keep sediment on the lot, and seed and mulch keep it there for good once grading ends.

How a typical job runs

• Site visit: soil check, slope, sun, irrigation and truck access
• Written estimate with prep, seed mix, mulch and erosion control itemized
• Grading, rock picking and topsoil where the ground needs it
• Silt fence and inlet protection before soil is left bare
• Spray: seed, mulch, fertilizer and tackifier in one pass, two on slopes
• Watering plan for your sprinklers, then a follow-up look at thin spots

Hiring a crew or renting a kit

Hydroseeding kits and rental machines exist, and for a few hundred square feet of flat ground a careful homeowner can get decent results. The trouble starts with bigger yards and any slope. A small machine applies thin, uneven mulch, the mix ratios are easy to get wrong, and a patchy spray shows up as a striped lawn six weeks later. Hydroseeding contractors bring a tank with mechanical agitation that keeps seed and fiber evenly suspended, so every square foot gets the same rate. We also carry the prep tools, the right seed for the season and the erosion control materials a slope needs. If your project is small and flat, we will tell you honestly whether a kit or dry seed would do the job.

Water use and lawn size

Statewide droughts have strained the city's water supply, and new grass is thirsty for its first month. We often suggest seeding only the turf area you will actually use, and putting slopes, parkways and side yards into a native or low-water mix. That keeps the lawn healthy on less water and still covers the soil.

Inside the city we work from the Westside and the coastal plain across the basin and through the San Fernando Valley. North of the Santa Clarita divide, Santa Clarita, Palmdale and Lancaster bring new subdivisions and high-desert ground where natives often beat turf. To the west, Calabasas, Agoura Hills, Westlake Village, Thousand Oaks, Moorpark and Simi Valley mix oak-shaded yards with fire-prone hills, and Malibu has some of the steepest burned slopes in the county. Along the San Gabriel foothills, Glendale, Burbank, Pasadena, Altadena, La Canada Flintridge, Sierra Madre, Glendora and Claremont deal with canyon runoff, heavier storms and lots cleared after fire. To the south and east, Rancho Palos Verdes, Whittier, Diamond Bar, Walnut and Chino Hills bring landslide areas, tract slopes and older grove soil. Each town page explains what makes seeding there different.