Entire Lawn is Brown & Dry!! Help!!!!

8 years ago

We moved into a new house that has been sitting vacant for 3 years. Along with getting everything else in livable order, I’ve been wondering how I’m going to go about reviving the brown, “sleeping” (hopefully not dead), EXTREMELY DRY soil (crumbly), lawn! I’m guessing that the early fall here in Seattle, will probably be the best time to do all of the work on it? Needing to be as frugal on the project as much as possible! My husband and I will be doing all the work ourselves. Question is do I start all over, by taking all the dead grass out to the dump, or try the over-seeding method? (I have done the overseeding method before on other lawn, but never ripped up entire lawn to start from beginning)...any advice would be very helpful thank you!

Featured Answer

User

8 years ago

Surrounding lawns look about the same, so it's not something I'd worry much about. It does look like you could benefit from an overseeding, but check with your new neighbors to see what kind of grasses you have. If dryness is a common summer pattern and this is a northern lawn, I'd suggest something with Kentucky bluegrass in it. It'll go brown, but it'll survive the experience.

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Comments (7)

gardengal48 (PNW Z8/9)
8 years ago
Unless you water heavily that is just what lawns look like in the Seattle area in late August!! It is dormant, not dead, and will come back to life rather magically with cooler temps and more rain in fall.

But I agree it could use an overseeding to fill in the bare spots. KBG is not recommended for use in western Washington - it just doesn't survive our very dry summers without copious amounts of irrigation. Most area lawns are blends of fine fescues and perennial ryegrass. And most area nurseries will carry seed formulations designed specifically for ths area, so easy to find.....but make sure it says for northwest lawns rather something more generic from the box stores. The last part of next month is an ideal time to overseed here so you have some time to do necessary prep work first. At the very least, get rid of any existing weeds and aerate before overseeding.
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Bradi Jones
Original Author
8 years ago
@gardengal48 Hi! Thank you for your advice on my lawn. I live in a West Seattle.
I’m wondering if I can ask you one more question regarding this one!? Would I need to dethatch and aerate, then add compost dressing as well!? ? I just planted new arborvitaes in the front of the yard, and when I was digging up the grass for their bed, it was crumbly, dry and NO WORMS OR BUGS at all! But pretty compacted! And the pieces just crumble apart. That can’t be good right?! It just feels like I need to add MAJOR compost to the lawn before I seed!? Would that be overkill?
gardengal48 (PNW Z8/9)
8 years ago
I'm not sure there's enough there to worry about dethatching - that might be a step you can skip :-) I'd give it a bit of rake and see what you turn up, then decide.

And I would recommend core aeration but I'd likely water things down first unless we miraculously get a decent rain in the next couple of days....whch is unlikely. And I would spread compost after aerating. Not too thick - a half inch will suffice - and water well again. Once the plugs have broken down (the watering will help), cut as low as you can and then overseed. Apply another thin layer of compost over the seed and keep moist until germination.
Bradi Jones
Original Author
7 years ago
I would just like to add a couple of photos here toshow how well my lawn looks after all your insight to this question and a good winters snow!!...
User
7 years ago
Awesome! Yeah, that was just dormant, not dead!

If it's any consolation, our long-term forecast indicates that my lawn will look a lot like yours did. We're supposed to end up with hot and dry conditions by July and I hate throwing drinking water at the lawn unless I absolutely have to in order to keep it alive.

The gardens are another story and I'll water those, of course. But you can look forward to my photos of straw come about July fifteenth--and a nicely recovered lawn that looks like nothing ever happened in October. :-)
Bradi Jones
Original Author
6 years ago
Here’s an updated photo to show how much I’ve done to help the lawn at the rental house! It’s so thick and lush that I can’t get through it with my little electric mower!