My lawn service has plans for up to 8 sprayings or feedings a year. You might want to look into the other plans also. If you are already doing 3 and it's still not making the lawn look the way you wanted, talk to them about having more visits or about other services.

What kind of grass do you have? And pictures would be very useful to see the current grass conditions and growing area.

I have bright shade, even morning sun in some spots, but my St. Augustine grass can't seem to get established there. It's a combination of forgetful watering and nutrient-poor soil for some areas. For others, it's just the wrong grass type for there.

They do 4 sprays a year (mainly just weed control and fertilizer). We only do three of the four because we don't have sprinklers and didn't want to burn the grass up. I will try to post pictures when I can. We have two trees but there is still ample sun (in my mind at least). Grass is a mix of ryegrass, fescue, and Kentucky bluegrass.

Bumpy soil is caused by rototilling before putting the grass down. It takes about 3 years for the soil structure to become established following rototilling. All that time it gets bumpier and bumpier. That ca be fixed. Search for lawn leveling.

You don't have sprinklers. Does that mean you live so far out in the country you can't get a hose and oscillating sprinkler? Because I have seven hoses and 5 sprinklers attached to the hoses. Or do you just choose not to water? Because if you choose not to water you will have to simply accept a thin lawn. Or you could seed (next fall) with a mix of prairie grasses like blue grama and some of the wheatgrasses which grow well in Neb. Those will survive nicely and usually remain green all summer with just occasional rain. You only have to mow them about once a month. It's a good choice for full sun lawns where you're going the extra mile to save water.

We run several sprinklers throughout the year. I'm hoping to get things filled back in with regular water and some seed but not sure on why everything is so bumpy. We've lived here for 8 years and it's always been this way. Although the thin grass just seemed to start. The yard was full of weeds when we bought the house.

Ok so you do water it. I misread that earlier post. It's hard to improve a lawn when the owner doesn't want to water it.

The secret to watering is deep and infrequent. Deep means 1 full inch all at one time. You'll have to set up your sprinkler and put out some cat food or tuna cans. Then time how long it takes each of your sprinklers to fill up the cans. That will be your normal watering time from now on. Infrequent means once a month in the cool weather and as much as once a week when the temps get into the 90s. Quite often we see that just fixing your watering regimen will solve much of your lawn problems. That should get your grass growing.

If you want to green up the lawn, you need fertilizer. If you want to use organic, then you can do that any time. If you want to use synthetic (like Scott's), then wait until Memorial Day. That will keep your lawn fed all summer. Then on Labor Day, fertilize again for the fall. Then on or about Thanksgiving, do it again. This last app will prepare the grass for next spring.

Here's a couple of the thin spots. The whole backyard is bumpy.

Any other thoughts by anyone?

Would a powdery mildew cause this? We've had that in the past but after spraying a fungicide it just seemed to go away. I don't know if the bumpiness is related or not since the whole yard seems bumpy but only these two areas are thin.

PM's not usually that damaging, although it can run rampant.

It could be some other type of fungal disease, but identification at this point is difficult at best. Plus I'm not very good at it.

One quick way to get a tolerably good preventative down is to apply cracked corn or corn meal at 10-20 pounds per thousand square feet. That'll inject trichoderam fungus into the mix, which is the helpful little vampire of the fungal world. It hunts down, drills into, and drains surface fungi, which tend to be disease fungi. Trichoderma itself is harmless to the lawn, and the corn meal/cracked corn itself helps add organic matter.

Another possibility would be grubs or the like, which actually did the damage last fall and you're unlikely to be able to find now. Grubs aren't big feeders in spring, they're getting ready to turn into whatever sort of beetle they're going to be.

Given the patchiness and lack of large, contiguous dead areas, I'm thinking it's a combination of soil issues, hence the recommendation for the Logan test. This looks more characteristic of a resource-short soil.