Saltene is just one of many different names for this especially tough and resilient lawn variety. This particular warm season grass has quite unusual origins and has rather different characteristics to most other popular lawn types used in Australia. Having said that, Saltene can be brought up to and maintained very well like many other lawn varieties.
Similar in appearance to the ever popular fine leafed Couch lawn, also similar as this grass has both above ground and below ground runners (stolons and rhizomes). Saltene is very robust, with strong leaves and stems to endure rather rigorous physical demands, meaning it won’t damage so easily like other lawn varieties can.
Saltene has slightly better shade tolerance than Couch, though still not to be considered as a shade lawn, and is very resilient to any water issues such as minor flooding, waterlogged soils, or if living by salty or brackish waters. Saltene however will not tolerate drought or frost.
When maintained well with regular lawn mowing, watering, and fertilising to keep the lawn healthy, Paspalum vaginatum will be quite disease and pest resistant on its own, though it will not be immune to such common lawn problems.
This toughness of the lawn will also require us to maintain our lawn mower blades with sharpening a little more often than if we had any other lawn, and while we can most certainly keep a Saltene lawn cut low and looking like a bowling green with a cylinder mower, these blades too will need to be sharpened a little more often.
The parent plant (Paspalum vaginatum) which makes up a Saltene lawn has been bred into a number of different varieties in use all around the world, including being used on golf courses and in sporting venues where toughness and durability are most being sought after.
Other names for Paspalum vaginatum lawns include biscuit grass, swamp grass, silt grass, seashore paspalum, swamp couch, and saltwater couch.
More common cultivars around the world include Adalayd, Seadwarf, Sea Way, and Salam.
Uses For Saltene Lawns
Saltene grass remains highly under-utilised in this country, we could be using it in so many more instances than we currently do, so many of us have been almost ‘programmed’ to automatically buy a Buffalo lawn or a Couch lawn, some others of us may turn to a Male Sterile Kikuyu or a Zoysia, yet there are more quality grasses out there to be used, should we only turn off our radios and do a little research instead.
Saltene, as already mentioned, has a fine leaf like Couch grass, it can be mowed higher with a rotary mower, or cut short with a cylinder mower, and it’s a grass that can present itself very well like any other lawn.
The unusual beginnings of these Paspalum vaginatum lawns include this grass being native to swamps and brackish water, and even heavily saltwater, this is where this lawn types gets its legendary durability and salt resistance, and this is why Saltene is so good to be used as a lawn anywhere we may be living by the sea or ocean due to being the most salt tolerant lawn variety available, and where our soils contain a high salt content. Saltene can even take regular daily ocean sprays and not be affected at all, other than the salt killing any weeds in our lawns, while leaving the lawn itself alone. Even if we’re left with only using grey-water for our lawns, Saltene won’t mind it at all, whereas other lawn types may just curl up and die from any such abuses just listed.
These traits make Saltene perfect for homes near the sea, or in any areas where water quality may be an issue, or anywhere else where poor quality soils and other general conditions may not otherwise be generally suited for a lawn to grow. Saltene is just outright tough, yet can be maintained to high lawn standards.
Saltene is not going to take over the world or Australia as a high preferred grass type, it’s not for everyone nor to everyone’s taste. For those of us who live in trying environmental conditions, yet still want a nice home lawn, then Saltene may very well be a perfect grass for our needs, Whether we live by the sea or ocean, or by estuaries, or we have naturally poor quality soils, or if our region experiences heavy rainfall, or we just want a really tough hard-wearing grass, then Saltene provides some of us with a very worthwhile solution, and is a grass which does need to be given much greater consideration by many of us who live in trying environmental conditions which may otherwise not be the most suited to other lawn types.
Warning For Paspalum Vaginatum Lawns
Saltene and all other variant names of Paspalum vaginatum are, as we can tell from the name, derived from the Paspalum family.
There are many many different types of plants which are a part of the Paspalum Genus, of which some are weeds, including the Paspalum weeds many of us are familiar with. If our Saltene lawn becomes infested with Paspalum weeds, then the same weed spray which is used to kill Paspalum weeds from our lawns will also kill our Paspalum derived lawn, so we must never use a Paspalum weed killer on Saltene lawns.
Instead, our best course of action to remove these weeds would be to hand pull them with the aid of a small digging instrument such as a hand garden spade, or gardening knife to dig out the roots with the weed.
Alternatively we could contact a weed spraying professional to assist with our needs.
We could also spot touch the weeds with a weeding wand, or by spot treating individual weeds with Glyphosate herbicide, being very careful not to let any Glyphosate drop onto the lawn or any other plant, as this is a broad spectrum herbicide designed to kill any plant it comes into contact with. So great care should always be taken when using this weed killer.
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