Guys, this is a small front lawn which I usually fertilize before rains and irrigate if it gets too hot. The first picture is the ‘before’. Then our baby arrived 3 weeks early, and we had to stay in the hospital for two weeks – and add another week where I couldn’t tend to the lawn immediately after getting back, which led to the second pic – really tall grass. There was some decent rain during this time and I had already fertilized earlier so I guess the grass had good conditions for growing. When I finally got around to mowing (my first mower died because the grass was so tall, and I had to get another one) and now there are a lot of light brown patches that are scaring me – 3rd and 4th pics. I mowed to maximum height on first pass and a lower height on second pass. My plan is to mow lower once more and give another round of slow release fertilizer and maybe irrigate if no rains. I’ve never seen this degree of discoloration on the grass and am worried if patches are dead? Any and all advice welcome! 🙏🏻 (the worst part is that I have the robot mower for the front lawn sitting in the house not installed yet – the back yard, which is much larger looks perfect through all this time just because of the robot mower)
by SnooCookies8270
22 Comments
3rd photo was right after the highest deck cut? This doesn’t seem right.
Yes that should be recovering in the next 2-3 weeks. You just cut to low. You typically don’t want to mow more the 1/3 of height in 1 mow.
Happens when you do a big chop, keep cutting short and it will correct itself.
Looks like it will recover.
You should have stopped at mowing at the highest setting and then waited a few days before moving lower (try not to cut more than 1/3 of the grass off).
I would keep it at the same highest for at least a week before slowly bringing it down to your normal height.
The brown patches are normal after scalping tall grass.
You should’ve cut it less off multiple times and slowly worked the height down. Some may recover.
Stress from getting its lushish wavy hair cut by the looks of it. My eyes are seeing yellow over white. Correct me if im not seeing it right, but if it’s yellow it will come back. White it’s dead. We have a small pasture that our one horse doesn’t eat fast enough so we it with the jaw mower and it yellows and comes back after a bit and looks a lot like what im seeing in the photo.
Remember, grass is a plant. If you chop most of it’s food source off (the grass leave) it’ll be a bit funny about it. As others have said, little and often is the key. ⅓ is the rule of thumb but just little by little every couple of days or so.
https://preview.redd.it/8s9yx7x1g3bf1.jpeg?width=1334&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=f929e3319ba79fd2b2375df80fb0fea9bf3d5ae1
Did the same thing and it is already recovering after 2 weeks. From leaving it uncut for 3-4 weeks
Your grass yellowish brown, the color of grass stems deeper down. A white or grey brown color is dead. Beige/tan brown is dormant for many species of grass. With time, water, and a light fertilizing it should start to recover.
I have some Bermuda grass patches I treated heavily in the Spring for poa annua that are a crispy brown right now despite the rest of the lawn being a nice deep green. Those areas are just stressed out. The grass breaks off right down to the ground but I can also see new green sprouts coming up from the roots and runners. I’m raking in some potting soil in those areas and making sure those spots get a little extra water when there’s no rain.
Relax just don’t cut it too short and it will green up
Could be grubs… which is a larger issue.
Yes. It will.
Pretty sure this damage is from overfertilizing and cutting wayyyy too much off in one mow.
looks thirsty
Thank you for this post bc this explains what’s happening to my lawn rn and reassures me it will recover
Water mow higher than you think
It will recover.
Congratulations!
You cut to much of the grass leaf off at one time. You should have cut max height first time. A day later you could try and bring it next step lower. With this heat you scalped your lawn by accident. It should recover as long as you keep it well irrigated with the high summer temps we are facing. Be patient it might take a few weeks to recover. Cool season grass slows down growing when we get into the 90*f temps.
Nope…. Grass is done! 😂
What type of grass is it? Should bounce back in few weeks with enough water. Absolute worst case is it comes back next growing season.
Looks like it will, can I recommend planting some Clover within the grass to protect it from heat-death and low nitrogen discoloration? Will also protect the necessary bio-life in and on the soil.
Judging by your story, Im thinking that area is rather low on Nitrogen, and the high growth triggered the grasses to seed – at which time much more nitrogen is pulled from the soil to fuel the seed growth.
Clover pumps nitrogen from the atmosphere into the soil and would largely prevent that issue.