In desperate need of advice reviving my lawn

8 years ago

Hi all, new to this forum and looking desperately for help

I'm in Atlantic Canada and we built a new home 2 summers ago. I had a new lawn sodded with Kentucky blue grass in early fall of 2014. The lawn never really took off per say. I followed the instructions to water regularly and the landscaper applied lime and fall fertilizer. I was told that by spring my Grass should come in strong and thick. Well it never really did. I watered regularly through the summer twice a week deeply unless we got heavy rain. I applied fertilizer once a month ( I believe I may have put a little more than was called for on the bag). All summer it was ugly, dull yellowish brown through with no growth.. yesterday my father came with his john deer lawn tractor and dethatcher attachment. It didn't pull much up so I stared using a heavy steel rake and I was pulling up wheel barrows full of loose yellow grass every 10 or so squared feet. I couldn't believe it. I stopped after 20 mins because I only got a small area done. With this said I have a few questions. 1. Will a power rake work better for me. 2. Should I areate 3. Is there anything else I can do to save my lawn or is it better to cut the sod out and start over. Will some photos of the lawn in its current state help ? Thanks in advance for your time.

Featured Answer

dchall_san_antonio

8 years ago

You're doing just about everything wrong, so yes, there is something else you can do. Your watering and fertilizing plan is guaranteed to generate thatch. You're doing both far too frequently.

Watering: Deep and infrequent is the mantra for watering. This is for all turf grass all over the place. Deep means 1 inch (2.5 cm) 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 (32-37 C), deep water once per week. With temps in the 80s (26-32 C), deep water once every 2 weeks. With temps in the 70s (21-26 C), deep water once every 3 weeks. With temps below 70 (<21 C), 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.

Fertilizing: Once at the end of May, once in early September, and once in November after the grass stops growing but before it turns brown.

Mowing: Mulch mow at the mower's highest setting.

Here's a motivational photo for you.

All these lawns are KBG. The green lawn follows the guidelines explained above. The others water every day for just a few minutes. Thanks to morpheuspa for the picture.

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Comments (10)

Paul G
8 years ago
Photos definitely help. Have you talked to the landscaper?
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User
8 years ago
I keep looking at that photo and I keep thinking there's no way the difference is due to watering alone. The line between the two lawns is too straight and clean and there's no way to water straight like that, there's always going to be overspray. I think cultivar selection and good fertilization practices account for at least 60% of the difference in that picture, not just watering
Don
8 years ago
last modified: 8 years ago
Nothing wrong with letting a lawn go dormant. It won't be as thick as irrigated lawns most years. But aesthetics in ornamental horticulture are all subjective. The guy with the greener lawn above doesn't "win" except in his personal opinion.

In the last few years, a green lawn in summer brings scorn and ridicule in parts of California.

I enjoy my green lawn, but I'm fine with my neighbors who don't water.
dan_gour
Original Author
8 years ago
It's not letting me post a photo for some reason but my lawn looks more dull than that one on the left. I had a landscaper come yesterday. The lawn is not dead and in fact has some nice new growth below the dead grass apparently. He told me to power rake and aerate asap, then fertilize and lime. I did all this last night, raked about 2 half ton truck loads of loose dead grass. Took me 5 hours. The lawn looks much more "fluffy" and it's supposed to rain hard today, I'm praying that in a week or 2 I start to notice a change in color. I will follow dchall_san_Antonio advice on the fertilizing and watering and see how this goes !
danielj_2009
8 years ago
last modified: 8 years ago
morpheus, he of the green, green grass, has worked hard to get his organic content very high, and is able to maintain that level without excess effort, as I understand. The grass isn't green because he is doing something excessive. It is green because the soil is healthy and the grass responds accordingly. I say that if morpheus was in California his lawn would be the last to go brown and the first to recover. Healthy soils hold more moisture for a longer period of time. He has never aerated, dethached or raked. His soil biology eats it up and takes care of that. Also, j4's screwdriver test for moisture won't work on this lawn because the soil structure is so good that you can dig it up with your hands.

For comparison, here's my lawn in April. 90% of what you see hadn't been mowed yet and I didn't do anything to it. The 100's of bags of leaves I dropped on it last fall can't be found. I left it at 4" length into the winter, and it stayed green all winter under the snow, probably because of winterizing in late November (no snow mold formed). I am not caring for my lawn like this so it stays green in the winter, although that is nice. I do it to provide the best soil environment and the grass does what it does.

http://forums2.gardenweb.com/discussions/3836791/tufted-spring-kbg
yjoyce(Nova Scotia, Canada - zone 5b)
8 years ago
last modified: 8 years ago
I'm in Atlantic Canada too, and am getting advice from my neighbour whose lawn looks pretty good, he does a bit of yard work for folks in the neighbourhood now as well. He says:

"First aerate, dethatch then lime. Then the overseeing can be done after. Fertilizing should done at least a week after liming."

This is how he does their yard and their grass is as green and healthy as can be. Our lawn is 7 years old, where yours is younger, perhaps you wouldn't need to do both aerate and dethatch this year. But I did notice that trying to dethatch myself wasn't working well, the machine thing did it better.
User
8 years ago
@danielj_2009

I'm ok with all that, I'm sure he takes great care of his lawn. But that is my point, that picture is normally provided as "look what happens when you water deep and infrequent", and I think that's somewhat deceiving, there's more to that story than just the watering. For the record, I do agree that deep and infrequent is the right thing to do.
danielj_2009
8 years ago
j4: The moon must be aligned with Jupiter because I agree with you and Yardtractor on the same day. I think the caption of the photo should be more like "properly cared for lawn vs typical neighborhood lawn." However, dchall does not directly claim that deep watering alone is responsible for the difference.
User
8 years ago
Lol Daniel,

I think the caption of the photo should be more like "properly cared for lawn vs typical neighborhood lawn."

That still wouldn't meet truth in advertising guidelines. I'm not sure when that photo was taken, but I do remember him saying a couple of years ago that he had applied an enormous amount of Milorganite (bag rate every week?) one year and I believe that was in addition to all the leaves and soybean meal he regularly applies.

In desperate need of advice reviving my lawn

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