new sod turning yellow - help!

10 years ago

Sunday evening I got a call, that a family member had 2 pallets of Sod left over from their yard they sodded that weekend. I I went over and got some; and laid the sod as they recommended (I have never laid sod before). More or less, I had a few tire tracks I was filling in around back and a spot out in front of our porch (dog dug a few holes and we filled them in). Roughly about 25-30 roles.

I watered the area really good that night, since our yard was dry. I used a fan sprinkler in each area for about 30+ minutes each. The next day it got around 85ÃÂ° and the sod started to yellow in patches.

In fear I would forget to water the lawn, since its getting near a holiday weekend. I went to Walmart and got an Orbit 2 station timer and setup 3 in-sprinklers in the front and 2 in the rear. I have the sprinklers set to run at 6:30 AM and PM for 20 min cycles. By the end of 20 minutes the ground is saturated, but NO ponding.The sprinklers are more misters. If I remembor correctly they are Nelson Rain Systems, which have 3 inline sprinklers and 2 15' sections of hose in the box.

Today (Tue) some sections look better and other sections look worst. Not sure what the issue is, since I am new to this. We did get 1" plus rain last night, and temps today are around 88-90ÃÂ°

Another thing that may make a difference is I laid this sod directly over the ground. Before laying I did take a rake and rough the existing ground/grass up, but some sections were partially grassed. I did not role it with a weighted roller, but did try to make sure it had a solid fit to the ground.

The sections that are shaded by the porch or house seem to be doing the best, but its really hit or miss. Should I add some fertilizer, get fungus stuff, slow down on the watering or just keep doing what I have been? If it continues to proceed like it has been, the grass will be dead!

Comments (4)

hogan_nj
10 years ago
You have to remove all of the grass. It takes some time to prepare for new sod. I laid about 3k sqft last fall. I removed all existing grass. I put down some top soil mixed w/compost and watered it good the day before I laid the sod.

Someone told me before...you need to water the pi$$ out of it once its down.Some people recommend watering the sod as you are laying it down. I would think this time of year it would take at least a week to take root.

Main thing is to water and water deep.Especially since its so hot!!
hogan_nj
10 years ago
Also it would have helped if you rolled the sod to make good contact with the soil.
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If I understand correctly the grass looked fine for several weeks and suddenly got the various symptoms you described. Is that correct? You severely over watered for the first month and that is what led to the symptoms. The installer should have told you to water 3x per day for 10 minutes each time for the first 3-4 weeks or until the sod roots knit into to the underlying soil. Then start backing off on watering until you are watering every 5-7 days for about an hour. Even your nutgrass problem could be caused by the overwatering. It is a swamp grass and thrives with too much water. All the symptoms sound like fungal disease. The blob that looked like dog barf is commonly called dog barf fungus. It happens to be very ugly but it also happens to be harmless. You probably cannot really tell where that spot was several weeks later. The white stuff was likely powdery mildew. The blue areas were symptoms of not enough water but there are fungal diseases which cause the same symptom. The strong temptation is to add more water when that happens, but that is the wrong response. All the water goes to the fungus. How high/low are you mowing it? The installer should have also told you to mow at 4 inches (mower's highest setting). But this time of year is when you should be skipping mowing and letting the grass get up to 5 or 6 inches to endure the summer heat. Scalping fescue this time of year could be the problem for the large area that is dying. If you are mowing at less than 3 inches, then you cannot blame the installer for much of any of this.
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JCW3
Original Author
10 years ago
Thanks for the advice...

A few other family members took advantage of the free sod and laid it very similar as I have. The ones that have been watering SUPER heavy seem to be doing the best.

With that I mind I feel I may have to up my water to help get things going. I pull the sod up last night and checked to see what it looked like. Soil was moist, but not overly wet by any means.

Also when I picked up the free sod, I opted to take the sod from the top of the pallets. Since the sod had been on the pallets all weekend, I feel I may have ended up with some of the dry sun scorched rolls. I honestly believe this because some of the yellow/dead rolls, was the first ones we loaded on the truck/last ones to lay on the ground.

When looking closely the roots still look good and there is green life near the soil. My goal at this point in time is the water the PI$$ out of it and hopefully it will recover. The holiday weekend is suppose to be mild, so hopefully it will recover with a little TLC...

I don't have a roller, but I did walk the area over really good last night and tried to eliminate any air pockets. There was definitely some air pockets under the sod, but amazingly those was the GREEN patches.
hogan_nj
10 years ago
I'm no expert by no means but sod should be installed the same day. Good luck,hopefully it will work out for you.

new sod turning yellow - help!

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new sod turning yellow - help!

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