Just moved in, lawn turns brown?

kR – posted 12 August 2004 22:12

I just moved into a house that’s about 2 years old. The bluegrass lawn looked excellent when we moved in, but the neighbors said that the previous occupants watered every single day no matter if it was raining. So I tried to cut back the amount of water we were giving the lawn and it immediately turned brown in large streaks and patches. Most of the streaks are near the curb to the street and the perimeters of the lawn.

This, of course, looks horrible and my house is at the very entrance to the neighborhood, so I want it to look good.

I had a horticulture specialist (just a lawn & garden guy that went to college for it) come and look at it and he said the grass was suffering from drought. Well, duh, what can I do to stimulate the growth of the roots?

I tried to do a sort of areating with a device that cuts lines in the lawn because it worked wonders when I seeded my previous house’s lawn, but I’m not sure if that’s enough.

Also, when I did run the machine over it, it kicked out a lot of what I would characterize as some kind of dry, brown mossy substance. Is this just some kind of material to hold the sod together while they are laying it down?

cohiba – posted 15 August 2004 11:51

Sounds like thatch? Anyway, take a soil sample and find out why your lawn needs so much water. You may need to increase organic material in the form of mulching leaves over top with a mower and adding an organic fertilizer to your program.Chances are that thatch is keeping your soil from getting the water it needs to keep the turf going. Without over doing it.

What type of soils do you have and where are you located?…………

Dchall_San_Antonio – posted 03 September 2004 12:48

Nice favor they did you by watering every day )c: You have the classic drought sensitive lawn that daily watering promotes. What you need to do is deepen your roots. When I converted to deep watering I did it with a soaker hose. I laid out 100 feet of it and turned on the faucet to a trickle. I left it on day and night for 3 weeks before moving to the next zone.

Now I water with an impact sprinkler for 2 hours per zone, one day per week during the hottest part of summer, and one day per month the rest of the year.

My next door neighbor, before she moved this summer, had not watered her lawn one drop in 5 years and it looked better than mine. Deep roots from deep watering is the answer to your problem.