(Portions of the lawn in front of the Utah state Capitol are turning yellow as the governor announces watering will be reduced on state property. Photo: Paul Nelson)
SALT LAKE CITY — Utah is in a biblical drought. Due to local water restrictions, your lawn died. How do you restore your green grass without watering? The simplest solution might be to paint that yellow grass green.
In 2014, lawn-painting companies cropped up all over California amid the worst drought on record in the Golden State.
Taun Beddes, Utah County director of the Utah State University Agriculture and Natural Resources Extension and the co-host of KSL’s Greenhouse Show, joined Dave Noriega and Debbie Dujanovic to talk about lawn painting.
“Have you ever painted your lawn green?” Debbie asked.
“I admit I’ve been out late at night or early morning before the neighbor’s notice to have the greatest lawn in the neighborhood,” Beddes said. “Being a horticulturist, you sometimes just can’t afford to have the brown patches because people start like, ‘Your horticulturist? And you’ve got that.'”
“Taun, you cheated,” Debbie laughed.
A quart bottle of lawn paint covers between 600 and 1,200 square feet. The seller claims it lasts for 100 days, looks natural, is 100% safe and non-toxic and is kid and pet friendly.
“You want to use a pump sprayer . . . you hold in your hand with the little squirt gun thing in the other hand,” Beddes said. “You spray it with a fairly fine mist. The paint is formulated to be safe for turf, so it doesn’t harm the grass at all. It’s basically just water-based latex paint that the more you spray the darker green it goes.”
“Did you just give me a $50 fix?” Dave asked, “because I was thinking this was gonna be extremely expensive.”
“You mentioned earlier that it’s used on golf courses,” Beddes said. “You know the Augusta National during the Masters is pristinely green. They want you to think they have these amazing fairies just magically blast the turf. They’re spraying that stuff.
“People are doing weddings in their yard; I’ve had a couple calls about that. They just need their yard to look really nice. I’ve recommended turf color for the brown areas,” he said.
“You said the last maybe three to four weeks. Is that through waterings? It doesn’t wash off?” Debbie asked.
“When you spray this, you want to wear old clothes that you can stain because it is water-based latex and it will not come out of your clothes or socks,” Beddes said.
“How does it feel? Because Dave likes to walk barefoot in his backyard a lot. How does it feel out under his feet?” Debbie asked.
“As soon as it’s dry, it’s totally safe and there’s no texture difference. It’s just that if you get it on your skin you’ll stain in your skin green for two or three days until it finally fades out,” Beddes said.
“If Dave’s kids run out, let’s say, and they start sliding around on the grass, do they come in with green stains all over their legs or what?” Debbie asked.
“Once it’s dried, it’s rain-fast and water-fast so as soon as it’s dry, you are safe from having it stain anything. I’ve actually gotten it on cement that stays there for months, so you need to be careful with that,” he said.
Dave & Dujanovic can be heard weekdays from 9 a.m. to noon. on KSL NewsRadio. Users can find the show on the KSL NewsRadio website and app, a.s well as Apple Podcasts and Google Play.