Sounds like creeping bentgrass. It likes lays down like that and forms ugly stringy thatch. Of course, if grass is coming up like carpet, you could also have a grub problem.

Here is a link that might be useful: bentgrass

Probably Pythium Blight by your description. When you say "certain areas are growing in strange patterns, different directions" would "matted" apply? Unfortunately if it is Pythium blight or Root Dysfunction you are in for a lot of trouble unless you are willing to spend some money. Look for a turf supply store in your area or Google "Aliette WDG" "Chipco Signature" or "Banol" You are looking at around 140-180 bucks for five pounds of Either the Aliette or Chipco, and almost 450.00 for the Banol.
Granted, it may not be Pythium, but you have described it's unique symptoms fairly well. The only thing I can suggest short of the above chemicals is to not water and for goodness sakes no more fetilizer.

Yes it is matted,the thing is,it's only in certain ares not entire lawn(front lawn). Could I just wait it out til fall and start over in these areas? Is it something that spreads to good,healthy areas?

You better get a fungicide down on what grass you have left if it's not too late. Sounds like the combination of warm temps, fertilizing and maybe too much rain also. I lost my grass last fall from too much rain...8", and it came out of the ground just like yours did.

By the way, when you have really young seedlings that aren't too strong you need to keep them a little shorter than you ordinarily would (2-2.5") until either the rains let up or the grass grows stronger. Once the seedlings mat over you can forget it.

The link explains brown patch, but it's pretty similar for all fungal type infections.

Here is a link that might be useful: link

fertilized 3 times already? That seems like a lot. How much actual N did you put down? Increased nitrogen increases susceptibility for most diseases and decreases it for some others.

Look at these pictures of pythium infected lawns to see if that looks like what you have. Do a search for other lawn diseases and see if that might be it.

Might even just be nitrogen burn. Nitrogen burn makes the grass look hay like along the whole plant. With fungus, you'll probably see some spotting or other signs of disease while parts of the grass look fine.

Corn meal at 20 lbs per 1,000 sq ft is mentioned here often as an effective way to treat many types of lawn diseases. Corn meal grows a type of fungus found in soil (trychoderma) that kills other fungi. I did one application of corn meal at ~15lbs/1000 sq ft and saw some improvement. I will be applying more this week.

I've seen references in university publications that indicate corn meal or trychoderma is effective against pythium so you might want to try it.

I sent a sample to my local extension office today.They are going to get back to me.

I do not see any brown spots or discolor. It just lies flat and slimmy looking. like i said in the earlier post,when I raked it just came right out,like my lawn was on chemo or something. I hope they find out why before its too late.

Meanwhile all my neighbors lawns look great and I thought I was doing all the right things this year. Mowing high,feeding(maybe alittle too much)etc..

This is what you should be looking for when diagnosing Pythium diseases....
Evening One (dusk).... Affected areas of turf will appear darker green than the rest of the turf and will sometimes look or even feel wet.

Morning One (dawn).... Affected areas of turf will have a very thin "spider web" on the top of the canopy.

Evening Two.... Affected area will begin to either lie flat or get a cowlick or bunched up appearance and the wetness will become a noticable sliminess.

Morning Two.... The thin cobweb will now appear like strands of thick cotton fiber. Bright white and noticable only in morning dew.

Day Two.... The affected area will appear greasy or oily and very dark brown or black in color.

Thats it... it's over for your turf for now. Pythium also hold pathogens that are easily tracked and spread by drainage patterns, footsteps, and equipment wheels. The affected soil also retains the pathogens, so even if you successfully re-seed in the fall, the following summer the disease will re-appear when conditions permit in the same areas.
The ONLY way to cure and prevent pythium is by using one of the two chemicals listed above. You must start June 1st, and spray four ounces in two gallons of water per 1000sqft every 14 days. If you miss an application it will return. I have read that cornmeal may inhibit the development of Pythium in turf that has not had a previous exposure. Whether this is true or not, I don't know. I do know that once you are infected, cornmeal won't do anything. No widely available fungicides will do anything to cure or prevent pythium. The chemicals I mentioned above..Aliette or Banol are difficult to obtain by a homeowner. You will either have to buy online and ship to a state that allows them to be sent to a home address, or get chummy with a Lesco Rep or Golf Course Super.

Good Luck.

Do a soil test too. Improper pH and calcium decreases the resistance to disease, including pythium.

Is it a big area? It may be cheaper to cut out the affected spots and replace with peices of sod.

Well I spoke to my local extension master gardener and she verified from the sample that it is a lawn fungus did not give it a specific name,just said it was a fungus and there's nothing I can do since its the middle of summer.

She said not to use a fungalcide because it will kill all the good organisms along with the bad.

Her only advice was to wait til labor day and reseed. The thing I don't understand is if I don't address this now, it will not just go away,right?

Why do you think she handled it this way? Does she not know what she's doing or am I missing something?

Ridiculous advice. There are two courses of action for you to take, and they have been spelled out.

1) do nothing

2) apply curative and systemic prevention fungicides, stop fertilizing, and cut back on irrigation.

Getting tests done and discussing the problem for days will not solve it.

If you think it's Pythium, put down what was advised. If you think it's Brown Patch, Summer Patch, Take-All Patch, Athracnose, or any other common fungus, put down chlorothalonil.

Or you can do nothing, wait for conditions to improve, and hope for the best in the fall.

The problem is I really do not know what it is. I will post a picture,maybe that will help to diagnose problem.

Thanks for your help, have not had much experience with local extension office but very disappointed with her action or non-action.

No Governmental agency is going to suggest nor advocate the use of chemicals to homeowners. You will more often than not receive "organic" solutions from county extension offices. Most of them believe that "grasscycling" or cutting at 4 inches twice a month solves all problems.

What I am trying to help you with is that your solution is in either one of two products. It will work fast, it will cure, and it will prevent. I suppose there are many organic homebrewed treatments that may or may not work. This is only June, and you are having disease pressure on your turf already. Wait until July and August when night-time temps and humidity rise. I fear you may have no lawn left. The solutions I suggest are expensive and definitely not for the average lawn enthusiast, but I have no idea what your goals are regarding the appearance of your turf.

To make this clear... ANY disease or fungus that you have that is NOT Pythium blight or Pythium Root Dysfunction will respond to Chlorothalonil. No long drawn out diagnosis is needed.

If it IS Pythium Blight, it will only respond to aliette or banol.

I am not going to be able to get my hands on any of those chemicals, and master gardener will not return my calls or email's so now I guess all I have left is to hire a professional.

How do you reccommend I go about doing that, go with local lawncare company or the lawn doctors...

Why not try the cheapest fix first as suggested by organicnoob? Cornmeal applied at 20lbs/1000sq ft. If it doesn't work, you're out what, $10?

Wow that's pretty lame. My local Rutgers master gardener offered to look at my fungus under a microscope to help determine what it is. Don't know if there was a charge because I decided not to go with it since the lawn started too look better after corn meal, milk and a new mower blade. You can see the before and after here. I posted a new pic this morning.

The Rutgers testing lab has an option to send in a sample and they'll have a mycologist examine it and tell you what it is for a fee. In-state fungus identification costs $50 but in your case it sounds like it might be worth it to know what you have since it sounds bad. Review this link for fees.

You can have a pro come take a look and they'll give you their opinion on what it is but you could also post pics here and get the same result which may not be accurate. The only way to know for sure what it is is to have it looked at under a microscope by someone with experience.

If you don't know what exactly you have you could just be wasting money trying to treat it.

Your pictures look simular but I think my condition is worse,mine has more streaks,oily looking in the morning and matted and in afternoon it is tan/brown and straw like.

To be honest,what good is it to pay $50 for them to tell me what it is when I cannot get the professional grade chemicals to treat it. I appreciate the idea but I think if I hire a professional sooner than later it can be taken care of before it eats up my entire lawn.

I am glade cornmeal worked for you but some people here seem to think it's more of a prevention than a cure.Money is an issue for me now(been laid off for 6 months)but I would hate to have to start a new lawn all over again,it sucks because before this happened it looked great,thought I did everything right, even put in the time this year because of the lay off.

Sorry, wasn't implying you use corn meal. I meant that these fungicides can be expensive and you won't be sure you know it will work if you aren't sure what it is.

You don't want to be in a position where some guy comes to give you an estimate, tells you what he thinks it is and charges you a couple hundred bucks that won't work against what you have or does work but what you had would have gone away when the rain stopped anyway. Try and at least get a couple of opinions from different companies to see if there's any consensus at least. It's been my experience that some pros are willing to come out to give you a free consultation in cases like this and then pressure you to buy their services right then and there. There's always a discount because they just happened to have the exact thing necessary in their tank sprayer.

As you can see from my photos it definitely wasn't used as a preventative because the disease was active in that area. I'm not even sure it was corn meal that did it, probably a combination of everything I did.

"I am not going to be able to get my hands on any of those chemicals..."

Chlorothalonil is not a pro chemical per se. Pro turf formulations are sold in pro supply centers because chlorothalonil is no longer labeled for use on residential turf (only for commercial turf). But it's readily available in other products in the big box stores. I won't tell the lawn police what you're using on your home lawn. ;-)

I personally would not put too much stock in the advice of somebody who tells you on June 17 that it's "the middle of summer." In my hemisphere, summer hasn't started yet.

Here is a link that might be useful: Ortho Disease Control

"No Governmental agency is going to suggest nor advocate the use of chemicals to homeowners. You will more often than not receive "organic" solutions from county extension offices. Most of them believe that "grasscycling" or cutting at 4 inches twice a month solves all problems."

That's a very broad statement. And I would think just plain wrong from what others have mentioned online.

If there's any entity that knows about what fungicides work in a particular area I would think it would be the university researchers at the extension offices that run the field tests that are used in the marketing materials aimed at the pros. So they get to play with them first in a controlled manner rather than just reading the label and seeing what happens.

Now, master gardeners are not the same people that run the field tests and do the research. I don't know what it takes to be a master gardener but it seems that like everything else in life, your mileage may vary.

I haven't done a survey of extension offices but most things I ran across have indicated that they didn't know much about organic methods. When I mentioned I was applying corn meal and milk for the fungus the reply I received was that those were not EPA registered to treat those diseases.

I believe I would check some garden centers (not big box stores) for some local "expert" advice. Some of these folks are pretty sharp. On fungicides, if you look at several of 3-4 brands you'll see they at least claim that they treat more than one type of fungus and for around $15-$20 for 13# (which is expensive to me, but...) I'd be inclined to apply some to see if it helps.

BTW, the above post I made with the link has all the different types of diseases listed on the very left side for you to just dial in what you want and read and look at the picture. I suggest you look through that site or one like it for some disease control help, unless of ocourse you've already done that.

BTW, Ace and several others carry funigicides with Chlorothalonil in it under the brand name of Daconil. I'm sure there are others if you look for them. Google is your friend.

Here is a link that might be useful: ACE

Overapplying fertilizer and getting a lot of moisture invited problems and they came.

I've tried fungicides after a problem was bad and never had enough improvement to make it worthwhile. The advice he was given was what I wound up doing whether I tried funcides or not.

An ounce of prevention, with better practices, is worth a pound of cure. Throwing a lot of chemicals at the problem isn't worth the chances of success for many who think further out than a few weeks.

But, we are still free to make those decisions, though the chemicals the govt will trust us to use at our leisure is getting shorter and shorter. Probably for a good reason.

OK, I decided to go the cheaper route and try the cornmeal,since i spoke to local agway and they sell it for $13 for 50 lb bag. I figure it couldn't do any harm and if it doesn't work I am out $13 bucks and I just ride it out and wait til fall to reseed.

I appreciate all your comments and I think I will try better maintence practices in the future and hope for the best,its not the end of the world.

Thanks,Brian