I must admit Aggrand is what I use and I do sell it. But I make this effort to educate others about foliar feeding because it is cheaper and easier. I can fertilize a customers yard shrubs and trees all at one time. And not have to carry around those heavy bags in my truck anymore. $35 in material will take care of an acre. And I am foliar feeding trees with disease problems and seeing them recovering with new growth. Here is a link that might be useful: Aggrand

I highly doubt its SADD if others in the area have the same looking disease. My guess would be brown patch. The area of brown patch that I had in the winter is greening up, but not fully recovered. The area has hardly any upward growth, it appears to be stunted, which is a usual characteristic after the BP occurrence. In order for these areas to fully recover and start upward growth, is to put some quality compost on the effected areas and keep it moist for a week or so. (bagged compost will also work). From past experience, compost is the only solution I have found for the grass to fully recover from Brown Patch disease. The experiment I conducted was to determine if I had Root Knot Nematode. I placed Corn meal on the area at the recommended rate and sugar on half of the effected area. Initially, the sugar half recovered faster, but currently the half with Corn meal only is doing better. It takes time to recover, try not to expect instant results. About sod webworms: The larvae are greenish with many black spots. Adults are dingy brown moths with a wingspread of about 3/4 inch. You will see alot of moths fly away (somewhat eradically) when you walk or mow over the area. The adults (moths) are laying eggs, and the larvae feed on the grass blades and cause noticeable injury within 2 weeks (early webworm damage resembles drought stress, even when there is sufficient moisture). They complete their life cycle in 5 to 6 weeks and have several generations each year. The soap flush technique is a good way to detect sod webworms. dchall is 100% correct. Last year he told me the same thing he told you about the paper wasp. In the past I would kill them because my wife was worried about them stinging the kids. In turn, I would get sod webworm damage every year. Last year I stopped killing them and I must say they proved to be a huge help to me. I only had a few very very small areas that were damaged by the webworms. I would always see the paper wasps hovering just above the grass blades hunting for there next meal. I also used the BT a few times last year. Timing is very crucial for the product to work. Apply BT 1 week after you first notice the adult webworm moths fly around, then reapply every 3-4 days if in full sun and every 5-7 days in shady areas until the moths are gone. If it rains or you run your irrigation you must reapply. Hope this helps Can you post a few pictures? It would help out a lot.

Hi elphaba, while putting down compost twice a year is nice, it is not really necessary. All you really need is one time followed by soybean meal and molasses to keep up the soil biology that you introduced to the soil from the compost. Just a lot cheaper and less work that way. Plus compost is too expensive to be using regularly for most homeowners unless you have large land to have enough organic materials to produce enough compost to cover the entire area. Frost in Houston? It's classified as zone 9, not 8. I grew up there and my mom still has a house there so I go there every once in a while to do major yard chores. Doesn't seem like her area gets frost at all. Her lawn is very green apparently from greensand that I put down over thanksgiving. Looks like spring right now with roses and azaleas blooming right now. I also had used soybean meal but greensand seemed to have dramatic effect on the front yard while the backyard that didn't get greensand isn't as green. it has 20% iron by weight plus loads of micronutrients.

We need to know where you live because Portland, Oregon is in zone 8b. If you live there my suggestions might be different than if you live in Texas. It is likely your lawn is late coming out because of something you did not do last fall. Did you fertilize after the grass stopped growing but before it went dormant? I realize this seems counter intuitive, but it seems to work. It could also be the angle of the sun hitting the front and back. If the lawn slopes to the south it will come out earlier than if it slopes to the north. The soil needs to warm up. Oh, and by watering it so much you are continually cooling the soil. This time of year you probably should be deep watering once or twice every month, not 3x per week. Deep and infrequent is the mantra for watering. This is for all turf grass all over the place. Deep means 1 inch all at one time. Put some cat food or tuna cans around the yard, and time how long it takes your sprinkler(s) to fill all the cans. Memorize that time. That will be the time you water from now on. My hose, sprinkler and water pressure takes 8 full hours to fill the cans. Your time will likely be less. I like gentle watering. As for watering frequency, that depends on the temperature. With temps in the 90s, deep water once per week. With temps in the 80s, deep water once every 2 weeks. With temps in the 70s, deep water once every 3 weeks. With temps below 70, deep water once a month. Note that you have to keep up with quickly changing temps in the spring and fall. This deep and infrequent schedule works in Phoenix and in Vermont, so it should work for you. The reason for deep and infrequent is to grow deeper, more drought resistant roots and to allow the soil to dry completely at the surface for several days before watering again. If it rains, reset your calendar to account for the rainfall.