Is my zoysia dead?

jl144 – posted 22 September 2011 11:34

I have zoysia grass in my yard. It was well established when I purchased the house 15 years ago. This spring I noticed the west side of the front yard (it’s split by a sidewalk and faces the south) had spots where the grass had turned a greyish/black. I consulted a local nursery and they thought it maybe chinch bugs. I treated it only once as we were having temps well over 100 with no rainfall. I typically don’t water the grass in the summer as I was told it’s better to let zoysia ‘grow’ in its natural state and become dormant. Now that we’ve had some rain the east side is greening up and now the entire west side looks dead. There are a few weeds growing here and there. I was thinking about burning it and seeing what happened. Is that even an option in the fall? Any suggestions prior to me tearing it out and putting in new sod next spring would be very helpful. Thanks in advance for the assitance!

seed – posted 22 September 2011 16:07

You said the entire west side looks dead. You did not say how long it has been since it rained. The east side is greening up and the west side is not, which suggests that the west side will not survive.

Burning a lawn is hazardous to houses and people.

You said that you were told to let zoysiagrass go dormant in the summer. That does not sound appropriate, considering it is a warm season grass. Perhaps that is standard practice in your region (where are you?) but it may have not been good this year.

Chinch bug are rare in zoysiagrass, and in the grasses in which they cause damage, do not cause greyish/black spots.

quote:Originally posted by jl144:I have zoysia grass in my yard. It was well established when I purchased the house 15 years ago. This spring I noticed the west side of the front yard (it’s split by a sidewalk and faces the south) had spots where the grass had turned a greyish/black. I consulted a local nursery and they thought it maybe chinch bugs. I treated it only once as we were having temps well over 100 with no rainfall. I typically don’t water the grass in the summer as I was told it’s better to let zoysia ‘grow’ in its natural state and become dormant. Now that we’ve had some rain the east side is greening up and now the entire west side looks dead. There are a few weeds growing here and there. I was thinking about burning it and seeing what happened. Is that even an option in the fall? Any suggestions prior to me tearing it out and putting in new sod next spring would be very helpful. Thanks in advance for the assitance!

jl144 – posted 22 September 2011 18:56

Thanks for the info… I live in St. Louis MO and we had over 18 days of little to no rain and temps in the 100+ range throughout summer. We finally had some consistant rain within the last couple weeks. What’s strange to me is this began with only about a 50sqft area in late April now the whole side is gone. I have burned it before. It’s about 150sqft area on either side of the sidewalk.

quote:Originally posted by jl144: