The Best Grass for St. Tammany Parish Lawns

If you are trying to understand the lawn you already have, the grass type matters. Cut St. Augustine like centipede and you will scalp it. Treat centipede like St. Augustine and it gets shaggy fast. Here is how we think about grass across Slidell, Covington, Mandeville, and the surrounding area.

The five grasses you will see around St. Tammany

1. St. Augustine — the default for most North Shore sun lawns. 2. Centipede — the low-maintenance choice for wooded lots. 3. Zoysia — finer blade, slower growth, higher installed cost. 4. Bermuda — full sun, athletic-field density, needs a lot of work. 5. Bahia — pasture grass that some folks use on very large lots.

The honest recommendation

For 90% of St. Tammany homeowners, the answer is either St. Augustine or centipede.

Go St. Augustine if: you have at least six hours of sun on most of the lawn, you run (or will run) irrigation, and you want a thick green look. Varieties like Palmetto and Raleigh handle our heat well.

Go centipede if: you have partial shade, you want to fertilize as little as possible, and you accept a slightly different texture. Centipede is the most forgiving of neglect of any Louisiana-suitable grass.

When zoysia makes sense

Zoysia (usually Empire or Zeon) is the premium option. Finer blade, dense, drought-tolerant, holds up well. But it grows slower, costs more to establish, and if it goes brown in winter it stays that way longer than St. Augustine does.

When not to install Bermuda

Bermuda wants full sun and a lot of input. In a residential neighborhood with any significant canopy, it will thin and fail — and once it fails, weeds move in fast. On the North Shore we almost never recommend Bermuda for front yards. It belongs on a football field.

Bahia — stop

Bahia is a pasture grass. It will grow in Louisiana, and it is cheap. It is also coarse, full of seed heads, and looks like what it is — a pasture. Do not let anyone sell you Bahia for a residential front yard.

Mixing varieties

Do not. Pick one and stay consistent. A mixed lawn will always look patchy because each grass grows at a different rate and color.

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If you are not sure what grass is in your yard, ask during your lawn-care estimate. A quick read of the turf helps us cut it at the right height from the first visit.