Put down a bunch of top soil and seed last year and it came in very nice (was completely bare after redoing my deck). However, it started dying off through summer and looks horrible now. I was watering every day, but I think it might have been too much seed at once and got choked out? Not sure what happened to make it thin out so much (other than some dog pee spots).
First picture is last year in late spring, the rest is what it looks like now. What should I do to get this back to looking okay? Was thinking:
Scarifier/dethaching machine to break up the soil
Add new layer of compost/topsoil mix
Seed / fertilizer
Thin layer of top dressing
Water
Is that a good plan? Any other ideas? Super bummed after it came in so nice last year…
by apelerin64
11 Comments
Keeping grass alive in the shade is always an uphill battle. Generally you have to commit to re-seeding once or twice a year.
What type of grass is it? Similar thing happened to me, and i thought it was due to lack of water, turns out it was fungus.
Also, you shouldn’t water every day after grass has been established. Water deeply once a week, about 1/2” to 1” of water, and set mower at highest setting. This allows grass to develop stronger root systems and being more drought tolerant.
For my fix, I ended up raking out all dead spots and removing material last fall and reseeding. It’s basically fully back now, but every 3 or 4 months I put down anti-fungal spray, and anti-grub spread to prevent it from happening again.
Keep it cut at 4-5 inches it’ll be a lot better
Roots were fried by the summer heat. Top dressing can encourage shallot rooting. Grass likely never really established deeply and was too fragile. Seed in fall so grass has more time to establish hardier roots before having to face the summer heat.
I had same situation, and was also baffled what to do. I ended up doing an amazing thing….took my grass 50% to test it out first…..burnt it with vinegar/water solution…waited 3 weeks. It all burned, then took tiller, scarifier/dethatched to scrape all the dead grass off. then aerate with hand aerator. Applied quality seed from gardening place (not Costco, not Home Depot, not Canadian Tire as their grass seed is not quality) with top soil (also from gardening) and starter fertlizer. Watered daily, but did not overwater. No walking, no pets, just wait for it to grow. Will be amazed at results.
Looks like the soil was ran down the hill.
1. Do a soil test. This needs to be done. Do not guess. Do not waste your time. I recommend to buy a lab kit for home use. On your first go, use the amazon kit you send in and compare your personal lab kit tests to the same sample as a control. Now you can be confident testing at home.
2. Add any missing nutrients. Possibly nitrogen, by far the most common missing nutrient. Note any nutrients that are too high. You said you’re adding compost/topsoil mix without the nutrient numbers – which suggests that you are using whatever dirt looks the best. Need to be scientific about this or you will continue to face this issue every season. Every bag of dirt has N-P-K ratios listed right on the bag. Take the soil test, replenish N-P-K only where it’s needed. I’m taking a wild guess and suspecting you have high phosphorous if you are just throwing any dirt on there. My neighbor did this too. “Just put some more dino dirt down”. Never worked. Too much organic matter decaying at once. High phosphorous makes it so plants can’t absorb as many nutrients.
3. Do not water every day. Your watering should be a few times a week at most. You need to do the screwdriver test in the dead areas. If you can’t poke it down 6” without a ton of resistance, you got a watering issue. If it feels really easy to poke down, issue. Infrequent, deep watering is ideal for grasses. If you water every day – the roots do not grow deep, they have no need to chase the water. This makes the plant weak and unable to absorb nutrients below the top layer of dirt. It allows weeds to grow and makes the plant less resilient to weather and damage. Infrequent, deep watering is necessary for a healthy lawn. If the screwdriver goes in easy, you are likely overwatering. You might have a septic system, and if that’s the case – you will need to modify it to not water your grass whenever it wants. Could use a storage tank or let excess water drain into the lake. Infrequent, heavy watering.
Overwatering causes fungus. You live on a lake. Probably high humidity. Could very likely be fungus. You need to check for shroomies and spray anti fungal spray if you see any type of mushroom or that type of smell.
Once your soil test is complete, and you check for watering, you should have a map of exactly what to do. If a nutrient is high, you need to put 0-0-0 dirt to compensate or whatever numbers fit. 18-0-0 double dark is really good for when nitrogen is low. If already high, just balance it. I balanced out my neighbor’s yard with 0-0-0 and double dark. Brought the phosphorous down and nitrogen back up. Lawn already grew back this year. No watering yet.
After re-reading my post. You likely are overwatering here. I mean the fact you’re on a lake is pushing me that way because I bet you’re allowed to use the lake water and or have a septic system watering it. My dad lives on a lake, his lawn looks like shit – his septic system waters whenever it feels like it, like if you take a shower. And he gets lake water he pays to have access to.
If soil test is good, read up and watch youtube videos about watering.
Last thing I can think of is a parasite. You need to dig and play around in your dirt. My grass had perfect nutrients and watering but was dying in tons of places. It drove me nuts! I was weeding by hand and ended up finding a bunch of little worms. Turns out I had a worm infestation – because they were attracted to the huge snack – sod, in a neighborhood full of lawns made of weeds. 3 days after applying a pesticide, my lawn was back on track.
Weed your yard and pay attention to any bugs.
Hope this helps. Feel free to reach out if you have any questions.
Get a tarp and tined metal leaf rake (I like the rakes from Tractor supply and 12×16 or 10×12 brown/silver tarps from Home Depot. The blue tarps are worthless). Rake the entire yard to remove debris and stones. The sooner the better as it will be really easy to do now.
Then reseed the bare spots with a mix of sun and shade grass seed. Add a thin layer of straw on top of the seed to minimize seed dispersal. And then don’t mow until the straw is gone. Let the grass get established first. Helps to keep the seed wet everyday for the first 7-10 days. So, you will have to water if it doesn’t rain. A sprinker saves a lot of time. Just have to move it back and forth.
The rule of thumb for cutting grass is that you don’t want to cut off more than 1/3 of its total length in a single mowing.
Where do you live that you seeded in the spring? Spring seeding cool season grass in the south will break your heart. It comes in beautifully but doesn’t have the established root systems to survive the heat of summer.
Other possible issues:
—shade and competition from those trees
—dog/human foot traffic
—mowing too low especially in the summer. Mowing high will help it shade itself from the heat.
If you’re in a warm climate, overseed again THIS FALL, water it well and deeply once it’s established. You’ll be much happier next spring.
Tbh it looks like it was worn out by dogs running back and forth.
Welcome to lawn life