The North Texas lawn calendar, month by month

Bermuda and St. Augustine on a DFW lot: when to put down pre-emergent, when to feed, how short to mow and when to leave it alone — from Texas A&M AgriLife’s turf calendars.

November 13, 2026

Almost every lawn in Dallas–Fort Worth is a warm-season grass — bermuda in the sun, St. Augustine where there is shade. Both go dormant in winter and grow hard from late spring to early fall, so the calendar runs on soil temperature more than on the date. Use the months below as a guide and the lawn itself as the final word.

Before any of it: get a soil test. AgriLife’s calendars start there, because it is the only way to know what fertilizer the lawn actually needs.

December, January

Dormant. Do not fertilize a dormant bermuda lawn, and AgriLife advises against watering it while dormant. The exception is a lawn overseeded with ryegrass: it gets a light feeding in December and again in February — half a pound of nitrogen per 1,000 square feet, from a nitrogen-only fertilizer.

February

Plan the pre-emergent. AgriLife says crabgrass begins to germinate when the soil two inches down holds 55°F for at least three days — typically early March in North and Central Texas — and a pre-emergent only works if it is down before that. Late February is usually the window. Check current soil temperatures on TexMesonet rather than trusting the date, and follow the product label.

March

Finish the pre-emergent if it is not down. AgriLife’s grassbur guidance for north Texas is to have it applied by April 1. Start mowing as the lawn greens up, but hold the fertilizer: the advice for both grasses is not to feed before full green-up.

April

Set the mower. AgriLife recommends 1 to 2 inches for a bermuda home lawn cut with a rotary mower, and 2½ to 3 inches for St. Augustine (3 to 3½ in shade). Either way, follow the one-third rule: never take off more than a third of the blade in one cut.

In Dallas, time-of-day watering limits start on April 1: from then through October 31, no sprinkler watering between 10 a.m. and 6 p.m. on any day. The twice-weekly schedule runs year-round — even-numbered addresses on Sundays and Thursdays, odd-numbered on Saturdays and Wednesdays, and no watering on Mondays, Tuesdays or Fridays. Hand watering, drip and soaker hoses are allowed any day. Other cities set their own schedules; check yours.

May

First feeding. AgriLife’s fertilizer FAQ puts the first nitrogen for the Dallas area around May 1, once the lawn is actively growing and has been mowed two or three times. A typical rate is half a pound to a pound of nitrogen per 1,000 square feet per application, with applications four to eight weeks apart.

June, July

Peak growth. Bermuda often needs mowing every week to keep from scalping. Water deeply and infrequently rather than a little every day. In St. Augustine, watch for gray leaf spot in warm, humid spells, especially in shade: AgriLife’s advice is to balance fertility, avoid high rates of quick-release nitrogen and water deeply and infrequently; fungicides are generally not needed on a home lawn.

August

Hold back. AgriLife advises against fertilizing during hot, dry stretches in late summer when water is limited. Keep mowing at the higher end of the range and let the lawn coast.

September, October

The last feeding of the year, if the lawn needs one. For St. Augustine, AgriLife says to stop nitrogen four to six weeks before your area’s average first frost. The Dallas daytime watering limit ends on October 31.

November

The lawn slows into dormancy. Turn the irrigation controller down or off as it does, and move on to the house: the freeze prep checklist covers outdoor faucets and the shutoff valve.