Try digging a bit. If you remove 1 square foot of turf, you should see grubs (or not). Anything up to about 10 per square foot is tolerable, if a bit gross, and anything under that is absolutely no problem at all. Your lawn can grow roots faster than the grubs can eat them.

Grubs don't emerge from the soil until they're adults, so you might be seeing some other insect. As to what it is, I'm not sure--true grubs of the chafer or Japanese beetle are C-shaped and up to an inch long, but the JB grub doesn't attain that size until very late in the fall or early in spring before they pupate into adults.

Now if you remove the turf and the level of grub infestation is so high you can't count them, it's time to do something about it. At this point in the season, GrubX and the like won't be effective, the grubs are too mature. You'd need to use something stronger like Merit.

Fortunately, I think re-entry on Merit is when it dries post the watering in process, so the dog doesn't need to be kept off long-term.

(whack forehead) sorry, I wrote Merit and meant Sevin. Sevin will kill grubs, Merit won't do a thing against mature ones.

Thanks, Morpheuspa. I have spotted several more the past few months just cruising the surface. Big, white milky body with a red face. They curl up in a C when I poked them with a stick. It was too dark for a picture though.

These puppies were big and were crawling through the top level of soil. I'm guessing they were about to pupate?

I'd curl up in a C if you poked me with a stick, though. :-)

Those probably aren't Japanese beetle grubs, which don't cruise, uncurl, or emerge on the surface. Grubs at this point for JBs are also relatively small, they just hatched in August, although they do grow pretty fast their first fall.

You tend to see those underground, on their sides, and always in a C shape.

If you can shine a light on them and notice 2 small antennae on the head its not grub but a slug. I saw a white-ish one crawling along my lawn this morning. Between them , the earthworms, and God knows what else its no wonder the raccoon and skunks were in my yard. I was able to minimize their damage (somewhat) with a yard enforcer sprinkler and a motion activated yard pest ultrasonic noise maker.

I've only seen grubs surface when it's extremely wet. Like days of rain. But I only had a few. A dylox application will kill anything in the soil including grubs. It's fast acting for 48 hours.

Merit 75 WSP as morph said can be applied in the early spring then again in the early summer for season long control. It only kills the eggs Which is the goal.

Here is a photo of one of the buggers. I managed to spot one cruising on the surface when I came home from work. This is identical to the ones that I have spotted doing the same thing at night.

Looks like your lawn is super wet. Only time they surface is if they might drown.( hence coffee can experiment) as morph said somewhere pull back some turf you suspect is dead. 12 or more grubs you need to take care of it less.. Just watch it.

Um. Ew. And yeah, I'd definitely dig down and look for grubs--although I can't positively identify that as a Japanese beetle grub. There's a method of doing so by inspecting the hair patterns at the grub's rear end...have fun with that.

I think I will let the little guys do their thing. If there was damage during the summer, it wasn't significant enough for me to really notice it. I have already overseeded the backyard on Labor Day and I'm not keen on ripping anything up to check for grubs.

I have the only lawn between all of my neighbors... All adjacent houses are just lespedeza and crabgrass. So I'm sure my lawn was very attractive to beetles. I've kept the backyard soil moist for almost 3 weeks now, and it's been raining nonstop for about 4 days.

If I notice them doing real damage, I will just let it be for now and do some repairs in the spring. I think the extent of any root damage at this point would probably not show until then because of the constant shallow moisture that has been available.

Come early June, I will see about using Grub Ex or some other type of grubicide(word?).

GrubX (the new formula) actually takes a while to work in and become effective, so May application is best. I try to have mine down by May 15th.

Most grub damage is from mid September to the final temperature drop for fall (usually October for me). Before that, the grubs aren't hatched or are too small to do much harm. Post that, temperatures are cool enough that the grass won't wilt and tends to stay damper.

Next spring, damage will be minimal to not noticeable. Grubs rise back to the surface after ground unfreeze but don't eat a great deal before pupating into beetles.

So really, if you can get through this bit of fall and GrubX next spring, that should stop the issue for the next year.