What are these yellow spots?

6 years ago

these spots have been around for a few years now. I always thought they were dog urine spots, but im doubtful about that now. It seems like something else. I need help asap as im about to mow the lawn soon, and need to know how to act accordingly.

here are some pictures. The rest of the lawn is green, and i‘ve been watering and fertilizing equally for the last few years so i don't see why the grass hasn't fixed its self yet. Any help appreciated! Thanks.

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User

6 years ago

A mold or fungus does seem likely, and I'm willing to accept snow mold as a tentative diagnosis. Gray snow mold is not generally fatal...but pink snow mold sure is. This doesn't look like the characteristic pink snow mold ( https://www.extension.purdue.edu/extmedia/bp/bp-102-w.pdf ), but we're very late in the season and this would be post-dormancy for the disease. However, it still isn't in the characteristic patterns.

I'm thinking it might just be age and natural patching out of a fescue lawn, particularly if the OP isn't feeding it 2-3 pounds of nitrogen yearly (Den, you'll have to let us know about your care regimen on this lawn).

Fescues don't repair themselves (easily or quickly, anyway, and only the new ones do so at all, and not very well from what I've observed), so reseeding in late summer will be required for that.

Bluegrasses do repair themselves, but only if well-fed. So if you choose a lawn seed this summer with bluegrass in it, make sure to a) keep watering the seed until the bluegrasses sprout, which takes at least 3 weeks, and b) commit to feeding your lawn on May 25th, September 1st, and October 1st, since you Canucks don't have the same holidays we do. The bluegrass will tend to close holes that open by spreading into them.

I'm not sure what direction you want to jump here.

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Comments (9)

dchall8 .
6 years ago
Where do you live?

What kind of grass do you have?

What is your watering schedule? How often do you water and for how long?
Den
Original Author
6 years ago
i don’t think this has anything to do with watering. The whole lawn gets equal water at the same time. i highly doubt watering schedule has anything to do with these random yellow spots. I just need someone to tell me what this is and how to fix this? Anyone?
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User
6 years ago
There's actually a reason he's asking this question, and a very good one. At least two of us have exactly the same idea in our heads.
Den
Original Author
6 years ago
Okay sorry.

i live in Canada

idk the grass type

I water about two times a week with the current situation of rain
dchall8 .
6 years ago
I'm so glad that Canada is such a small place with one, uniform, climate and soil type. Ok. I'm going to assume you live in St John's, Newfoundland. You can correct me if I'm off and you live in Gander. But if you live south of Detroit, then I'm going to get a little testy about your coy nature.

Sort of kidding with that. Canada probably does narrow it down enough. My concern was that you were not trying to grow a northern type grass in the south of the US.

You probably have fescue and/or rye. If you get some recovery from the problem every year, then you more likely have Kentucky bluegrass. I am thinking the spots are the result of snow mold. Morpheuspa might have more/better ideas.
Den
Original Author
6 years ago
my pardon if you thought I was being coy. I just wanted a response quickly, and didn’t think those informations mattered.

I live in south Alberta and my grass could be fescue as it looks similar to some pictures I found. Thanks for your response dchall.

if anyone with more info on this could help out, that would be great.

Also is there anyway I can treat and fix these spots without having to dig up and reseed?
Den
Original Author
6 years ago
Thanks morpheuspa. I think I will be reseeding the lawn shortly. I will scrape the dead grass, spread some grass seed and cover with soil. Would it be possible to just sprinkle grass seed and cover with soil or would I need to dig into the soil a bit?

Feeding wise, I have a Scotts AccuGreen 1000 and I fertilized on the ‘3 1/2’ setting but I have no clue what those numbers mean, nor was I able to find anything in the manual or website.
User
6 years ago
Hold off with the seeding until August 15th--seedings done in late May and June are going to fail spectacularly in summer. Grass is, actually, not a summer plant. It's a fall-winter-spring plant. Scary, but true--seeds develop in spring, set over summer and drop, and sprout in fall in nature. Grasses don't even notice frost or cold weather.

At least you feed. :-) Proper feeding is done by whatever setting the bag recommends (and they usually do have settings for the Scotts spreaders), on Memorial Day or thereabouts, Labor Day, and October first. While the last feeding, when the growth stops but the grass is still green (usually around November 1-25th) is optional, it does help.

Watering is entirely optional. Some do, some don't. I don't. But if you do, do it no more than weekly on most established lawns, a full inch at a time. Really, the worst you can do is daily watering, small amounts at a time. It encourages short roots and massive fungal infections...
Den thanked User