St Augustine wilt

Pinch52 – posted 10 July 2003 10:58

Certain areas of the lawn (areas in the sun all day) seem to wilt even when watered. Starts around this time of year and never seems to recover until the following Spring. Any way to avoid this??

Sir Skrip – posted 10 July 2003 13:52

Well, I have this problem whenever I go more than 2 days without watering. What I do is soak it up, in the areas that are wilted. And then in a day or 2 it looks much better. The areas that get the most sun is where I see this ‘wilting’… when i water daily it goes away completely.

Will-PCB – posted 10 July 2003 21:54

St. Augustine will thin out in the hottest part of the Summer. There is not one single yard I have seen that has not done so.

The way I minimize mine is by mulching (provided you do not have alot of seeding weeds), and by putting down Scott’s Turfbuilder.

Yes, the Turfbuilder will require a bit more watering (careful for over watering in this heat), but the mulched leaf blades will help your soil retain a bit of it’s moisture.

One good way to tell if your dry is to jam your finger down in the dirt. I put mine down atleast to the top knuckle. If the dirt is moist and sticks to it, I dont water. If its dry and sandy feelings, then I do water.

Hope this helps!

Dchall_San_Antonio – posted 13 July 2003 11:32

I call this problem, Unexplained Wilting in Otherwise Great Lawn. And I have found that the unexplained problems are fungal disease related. They might be low grade (thinning or wilty) or serious (large dead spots), but all fungal in nature.

You might try using corn meal as an antifungal on your wilty St Aug. I used to have spots that I just couldn’t get to thicken up. Wilty was a good way to describe them. Last year I used corn meal for the first time and they perked right up like normal grass. It’s experiences like that that have converted me to organic gardening. Today one of those formerly wilty is perfectly normal, thick, lush, and dark green. The other spot is still a little thin and the grass doesn’t grow as tall (or fast) there. I’m going to hit the yard again with corn meal at the next opportunity. “Next opportunity,” means when I get a reasonably cool morning that I’m thinking about it. Today would have been perfect except for church calling me away. Maybe tomorrow??

Anyway, apply the corn meal at 20 pounds per 1,000 square feet of area to fight off fungal disease. You can hardly over do corn meal but 20 pounds is all you should need to control this problem. Corn meal is also an organic fertilizer so you should see some overall greening about 3 weeks after the application.