What's the Best Turf for a Melbourne Lawn?

Side by side

Turf Varieties for Melbourne, Compared

Five turf varieties do most of the work in the Melbourne yards we see: soft-leaf buffalo, hybrid couch, kikuyu, zoysia and tall fescue. The first four are warm-season grasses that grow hard in summer and slow down in winter. Tall fescue is the odd one out, a cool-season grass that stays green when you'd least expect it to.

Which one's best for you comes down to three questions. How many hours of direct sun does the lawn get? What's under it, sand or clay? And is it for looking at, or for a dog who treats it like a racetrack?

None of them is perfect everywhere, whatever the label on the pallet says. A lawn that's brilliant in a sunny Beaumaris backyard can sulk under a big gum in Glen Waverley.

Soft-leaf buffalo

Is Sir Walter Turf Good for Melbourne?

Yes, and it's the one we'd point most Melbourne yards toward first. Sir Walter is a soft-leaf buffalo, and buffalo is the most shade-tolerant of the warm-season grasses, getting by on about three to four hours of direct sun a day. It grows slower than couch or kikuyu, so you mow it less in summer.

Garden Clinic rates buffalo at high drought tolerance and moderate wear. In plain terms, it'll handle kids and a dog, but if you've got a footy match happening every afternoon, it'll show it before kikuyu would.

You can only buy buffalo as turf rolls, not seed. That suits most of our jobs anyway, because instant turf gives you a finished lawn the day we leave instead of a muddy promise.

Hybrid couch

Is TifTuf Turf Good for Melbourne?

TifTuf is very good in full sun, especially on sandy soil or where you want to use less water. It's a hybrid couch, or bermuda, bred at the University of Georgia, and the university reports it uses up to 38% less water than its earlier varieties and stays green under drought stress rather than going dormant.

That 38% comes from the people who bred it, measured against their own older grasses, so treat it as a best case rather than a promise. It's still a big number, and on a sandy bayside block it shows.

Where TifTuf struggles is shade. Garden Clinic puts couch at about half-shade tolerance, so if you've got a fence or a two-storey neighbour throwing shade most of the afternoon, we'd steer you elsewhere.

Kikuyu

Is Kikuyu Turf a Good Choice in Melbourne?

Kikuyu turf in Melbourne is the toughest lawn you can lay in full sun, and the cheapest to repair because it grows back so fast. Bunnings notes it keeps its deep green colour well into winter, better than other warm-season grasses. Varieties like Eureka are only sold as turf rolls.

The catch is the same thing that makes it tough. Kikuyu spreads hard, and Garden Clinic notes its roots have a habit of overtaking gardens and veggie plots. If you choose it, you'll want a proper edge between the lawn and every garden bed, or it'll find its way into your tomatoes.

It also needs mowing often in summer. If you're the kind of person who mows when the neighbours start making comments, a slower grass will suit you better.

The other two

What About Tall Fescue and Zoysia?

Tall fescue is the pick for a cold, shady Melbourne yard where you want a green lawn all winter. It's a cool-season grass, so it keeps its dark green colour year-round, but it won't repair itself once it's worn, and it wants more water through summer than the warm-season grasses do.

Zoysia is the slow, tidy one. It grows in sun or light shade and grows so slowly you'll mow it far less, which is lovely right up until a dog digs a hole in it, because it's just as slow to fill that back in.

Local conditions

What Does Melbourne Do to a Lawn?

Melbourne gives your lawn three problems: soil that changes street by street, winters that stall warm-season grass, and rules about when you can water. Each one nudges you toward a different variety, so it's worth knowing which ones apply to your block.

Sand or clay

The bayside south east is mostly sand, which the University of Melbourne's encyclopedia calls "droughty in summer". Further in, the Australian Plants Society notes sand or loam over clay south of Burwood Highway. If you're on sand, you want a drought-tough grass like TifTuf. If you're on clay, you want good preparation before anything goes down, whichever grass you pick.

Winter

Warm-season lawns slow down once the soil cools, and couch and kikuyu in Melbourne typically turn straw-brown through June to August. That's dormancy, not death, though it doesn't feel that way when you're staring at it in July. Buffalo and kikuyu hold their colour better than couch, and tall fescue doesn't brown at all.

Water rules

Under Melbourne's permanent water saving rules, a sprinkler system on mains water can only run between 6pm and 10am, and you can hand-water any time with a trigger nozzle. That's no hardship for a lawn, because early morning is the best time to water anyway. If you'd rather not think about it, an irrigation system can be set inside the window once and left alone.

Choosing

Which Is the Best Instant Turf for Your Melbourne Yard?

The best instant turf for your Melbourne yard is the one that matches your sun, your soil and the way you use the lawn. Here's how we'd shortlist it for you.

1. Shade for half the day or more: soft-leaf buffalo, or tall fescue if it's deep shade and you'll water in summer.
2. Full sun on sandy soil: TifTuf, especially if you want to use less water.
3. Kids, dogs and constant wear in full sun: kikuyu, with a solid edge around every bed.
4. You hate mowing: soft-leaf buffalo or zoysia.
5. You want green through winter: tall fescue first, then kikuyu or buffalo.

Plenty of Melbourne yards need two answers: a sunny front lawn and a shady strip down the side. You don't have to pick one grass for both, and sometimes you shouldn't.

From the field

How We Help You Choose

I'd rather you pick a grass because it suits your yard than because it was on special. When we quote a lawn, the variety's part of the conversation, not a box ticked at the end.

1. We look at the sun. Where the shade falls in the afternoon, and whether a tree or a two-storey house next door is going to win.
2. We check the soil. Sand, clay or a builder's rubble surprise, because the preparation depends on it.
3. We ask how you'll use it. A lawn for looking at and a lawn for a kelpie are two different lawns.
4. We prepare the ground first. Stripped, graded, topped up and rolled before a single roll goes down, because preparation decides how it looks in two years.

Timing matters too. A Melbourne commenter's advice to someone planning winter turf was blunt: "dont bother this time of year. Wait until October". Spring is exactly when you want it going down.

Questions

Turf Questions