I’m in the northern metro area of Colorado. Sod is about 5 years old.
Every year, my yard seems to get more “streaky”, and I can’t seem to figure it out.
I throw down revive and Scott’s at the beginning of May and I make sure I have an even spread. My sprinkler coverage is great/even. I obviously notice it less when it’s short, but it becomes apparent when it grows.
Is this normal? How can I darken up the light spots? Any advice?
by Francescatti22
23 Comments
How do you spread fertilizer?
Scott’s spreader.
Definitely fertilized with a bad spreader or inexperienced person using the spreader. Im a partner in a lawn chemical company. We have new guys shut both sides of the broadcast spreader to fert tight spaces and forget to reopen them for the next yard. It drives me crazy… but they have to learn. To fix it just fertilize it the correct way and water
Have you tried using a broom?
fertilizer and also, are you using the same grass seed every year?
Go both up and down and side to side, adjust the settings so it adds up to the same number (eg. bag says level 4, change to 2)
Well well well. If it isn’t another one of Scott’s Tots.
If you wear clothes while you mow, then there’s less streaking.
It amazing the variety of ways a person can screw up with the same results.
Everyone who keeps saying spreader is missing the OP keeps saying he walked length-wise to fertilize, the streaks are clearly width-wise. Smh.
My guess would be water drainage coming off the house and rocks. I have a similar spot in my yard, but only one not multiple like this.
Is it ‘streaky’ in the same areas each year?
The bottom of photo 1/ left of photo 2 doesn’t look as bad. Could it be to do with the makeup of the soil from before the sod was installed?
Do you mow in the same direction everytime? I had this happen to me a few years back and realized it was from mowing the same direction/pattern each time. I now alternate horizontal/vertical.
Half tiger half woods?
do you have electrical, water line, etc coming into the house in these areas?
It’s almost certainly the reflection of sunlight from the side of the house. The shade cast by the bushes and planters provides those areas with a little less light. It would actually be possible to calculate your latitude and longitude based on the height of the plants, length of shadow grass, and angle from due north of that wall.
My thought would be bumps in soil leading to some areas being cut shorter making it lighter
I think you need to film yourself digging it up and see if there is a brick road or construction debris below it causing the streaking
Do you have pictures from when the sod was freshly laid? This is a big stretch, but I wonder if perhaps there were different batches of sod and for whatever reason some of the strips were different than others? Maybe even just due to some height differences that change the flow of water / height of mower cut.
I agree it’s probably some nutrient run off from the plant bed. Have you tried hitting it with a dose of iron to see if it helps even out the color?
Man I can’t imagine having a lawn where this is the only problem
The darker lines line up with your plants. My guess is slight runoff from your plant watering.