new lawn not performing like I expect it to

razors3639 – posted 02 April 2012 17:09

I cons***cted a new home last year. The new sod was put in the first week of August by a sod farm and their installers. I know the time frame was not ideal, but I have a sprinkler system and stayed on the watering.

I would say that only about 15% of the lawn grows how I would expect it to grow (rate, length, etc…..) the rest of the lawn is extremely slow to grow (could go 2 weeks between mowing) and the color is not ideal (blades are a mix of green and brown). In a spot or two if I look extremely hard I can still see the lines between individual pieces of sod.

I was waiting the winter to get it onto my fertilizer program (scotts 4 step) and have applied step 1 about 2 weeks ago. We haven’t had alot of rain and it is still too cold to turn on sprinklers here in MI.

I haven’t seen a significant improvement now that step 1 has been applied.

I am guessing that compacted soil and bad soil preparation from the sod farm is contributing to the lawn not perfoming as expected.

What is reasonable to expect from the lawn at this point? Will another season of care bring the lawn up to where it should be (watering, fertilzing, etct….)?

Should I consider lawn aeration? Will that be of benefit? My lawn is about 7500 sq. feet and would not want to start over.

Thanks in advance for any advice.

I wish I could post a picture, as it ***ly is worth a thousand words…..

Ray

tommy – posted 03 April 2012 21:00

Sounds like it needs to be aerified, and continue on the Scotts program. Warmer weather combined with proper soil moisture- will do wonders!

razors3639 – posted 04 April 2012 05:20

Thanks Tommy. I think I will give it a try. Hopefully it helps.