


Midwest. ~0.5-1" of top soil, spread grass seed, raked it all in with a steel rake then went back over the steel rake lines at 90 degrees with a garden weasel/hand cultivator. Watered 2x per day. It sprouted and was looking gorgeous. Over the past week, it has started to die off. The grass is all laying over dead in the same direction. The soil seems undisturbed. Some areas still look great. Backed off the watering to once a day about 3 days ago.
by remerator

19 Comments
Depending on where you are, just too hot. They will still sprout, but too young and roots to shallow so they probably baked. This is why you seed in the fall.
Too hot. Grass isn’t established enough to survive. For this reason its generally not advised to seed in the Spring/summer. Better practice is to wait until the fall
Too long and lying down while wet.
Just not enough root structure developed to uptake enough water to support it. It’s too hot. Seed again in the fall.
Its heat and humidity and summer misery, that’s why fall is best for seeding, but now you can just fill in the holes in fall, and maybe do a light total overseeding
Do you seed in the fall and expect it to grow before winter or do you seed it and expect it in the spring?
Probably an annual rye grass which dies off. Usually you should had some annual in the seed mix because it pops super fast and holds your grade in place. Your perennial takes about 28 days to germinate and that’s your good grass. Looks like maybe a straight annual seed was applied
Baby grass cannot handle extreme heat. This is why we seed in the fall. Grass at this maturity would thrive in September/October when the highs are in the 60s and there are less hours of sunlight
Always seed of fall , you get fall and winter and early spring to establish roots. Spring seeding , many times just doesn’t provide enough time to establish its root system
Did you back the watering off any? Watering grass this length twice a day will definitely cause fungal issues.
Come back in the fall and seed again.
Looks like it’s damping off
Looks like you may have put down too much seed.
My vote would be fungus or blight. Had it kill a similar small section of my established lawn practically overnight, last month.
Poor root development; Especially if you’re growing Kentucky Bluegrass.
Had a similar issue. Don’t know where you live, but much of America is having an unusually hot and dry summer. Near record heat and half the average monthly levels of rain. Very bad year for planting
Water?
Don’t plant grass in the middle of summer, it’s just too harsh
Have you got a picture of the seed label?