Help with Lawn issues

18 years ago

Hi,

Would appreciate help figuring out the issue with the lawn in our backyard. The lawn is less than 2 years old (we moved into the house when it was brand new in Oct 06 and the sod was laid about a week prior to that). Its made up of a mix of Kentucky Blue Grass and some other grasses to help with Minnesota winters. I have (tried to) attach some pictures below.

If it helps, the house is east-west facing so this part of our backyard is east facing and gets direct sunlight in the morning and almost throughout the day. The grass in the front of the house is a lot better and does not have this problem.

Anyways, so over the past year or so we have been noticing this area in the backyard develop patches like those shown in the figure. It started with a smaller area and seems to spread to other areas of the backyard over time (typical signs of grubs?). After reading through this forum, I lifted up the sod in a few spots to look for grubs and sod webworm feeding on the roots but didnt find any insects underneath, let alone grubs.

I have since applied Scotts with Halts fertilizer. So am not sure if I can do any more raking/lifting the sod to look underneath since the instructions for this fertilizer says to wait for several weeks before raking the soil so as to avoid breaking the barrier it creates?

Some other suggestions have been the clay in the soil which when compacts makes it harder for the grass to grow.

Would appreciate any guidance so that I can figure out what is causing this problem and how I can fix it.

Thanks,

Topper

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Comments (3)

philes21
18 years ago
Welcome to the forum!!

The usual symptoms, with a lawn that looks like that, amount to one thing, which I'll try to eliminate right now, and we can move on to another potential problem area.

At that sod farm, the seeds were planted, and gently watered, and they sprouted. From that point, the very beginning of their existence, they were fed, gently, every two weeks. A half application of fertilizer, something like Milorganite. The sprouts liked that: they grew, and they spread out, knitting themselves into a thick, green carpet of dark green lawn. They still got fed, every two weeks. Great food, too: Milorganite. A gentle (nothing heavy, it's a 6-2-0 formula, not like a big boomba first number, a 24-2-4 or something like that) fertilizer, delivered at regular intervals. Fed, and fed. Thrived, and thrived.

Then that sod got delivered to your house.

How much food has it had since?

Did you fertilize four times, that first year? (Which would have been a real cut, from what it had been receiving....).

Did you fertilize four times last year? A serious cut, from what it had been used to, but at least, it could survive. Did you give it a big feeding (two would have been better) in the fall? With a big first number fertilizer? Like a 28-3-3? Or a 30-4-2?

How much fertilizer has gone down on that lawn this spring?

As you might have guessed, this is leading up to the fact that most sod installs suffer from one thing: Fertilizer Starvation.

Tell me how much fert that sod has received, since it has been moved to your yard. If the answer is 'not much'....you need to get some fert down on the lawn. If the answer is 'darn little'.....you need to get More Fertilizer on that lawn. And if the answer is 'none'......well, you know what you need to do.
dchall_san_antonio
18 years ago
How often do you water?
How high do you mow?

And what is your problem again? I see the pictures but what part of the picture are you concerned about? I see clumpy turf in the background and a gray and brown turf in the foreground. In the clumpy area I would be worried that the Kentucky bluegrass has been eradicated by disease while the fescue has survived. How long has it looked like that? Does it ever fill in? The grass in the foreground looks like it has not received any water this year. Or it could be mowed too low which dries it out.
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superman03
18 years ago
I need help with my lawn. I live in South East Idaho and I am looking for something that can grow at least marginally in an area with dogs. Is there anything that I can plant that will grow in high traffic areas? paul_ricks@hotmail.com