I would do what’s called the “soapy water test.”

Get a bucket of water with a little bit of dish soap in it. Couple of tablespoons should be all you need. Pour it on the spots where the dead grass meets the green grass and wait to see if anything crawls to the surface.

My gut says that looks like insect damage.

 

Thank you for the info. Just tried it and did not see any bugs surface.

 

It looks dry to me. The areas that get shaded are greener than full sun areas so that’s what’s pointing me towards too dry.

 

@Redtwin @dofdk3 I sent a portion of the lawn to my local extension office to perform an analysis and below are the results:

 

@Redtwin @dofdk3 I sent a portion of the lawn to my local extension office to perform an analysis and below are the results:

View attachment 57183

"Maintain a soil pH of around 5.5" seems low to me.

What are most people's soil pH?

 

Have you ever aerated your lawn?
If the soil is compacted and dry the water and nutrients will not make it down into the soil. (Water can just run off)

 

I've aerated every year

 

It looks like you have done a lot to try to fix the issue. Everything you have collected seems to indicate you need to water more at one time and ensure the grass is getting the water it needs to support the Bermuda growing/surviving in that area. 2-3 deep waterings a week seems like it would go a long way.

 

I will definitely water more going forward

 

I didn't realize extension offices did that kind of soil test, and I'm not sure how they could make all those conclusions (soil is "dry" but you're supposed to dry out the soil before sending in the test, right?).

In any case, here is what I can deduce, with a different take than others:

1. You water every-other day, so I doubt water is the issue unless you irrigation is missing that spot every single time for some reason. Still, I would not expect to see dry bermudagrass turn to dirt like that, nor would it have that sort of pattern. Bermudagrass can survive a very long time under drought conditions and will go into dormancy if need be, but can still bounce back.
2. The grass closer to the tree trunk is fine, which suggests it's not directly from a shade issue.
3. Most likely culprit is going to be fungus or pest. My guess would be a pest of some sort.

 

Thank you for this information. I sent a 5"x5" lawn sample to the extension office and they sent it to the University of Georgia to perform an analysis for diseases or pests.

I will follow their instructions and add some fungicide and insecticide to my program to see if I get a positive outcome.

 

Any improvement on the lawn in the last month? Bermuda will be going dormant soon so I’m curious to see how you did on the recovery.

 

There was no improvement as my grass is going dormant. I will have to wait until next spring to monitor the progress.

 

Hi Experts,

Here is what I noticed today with the soil (tried to get as many angles as possible). Not sure if this is due to the snow we had in GA this month or if it is another symptom to the issue. Any ideas?

 

No change from before. The ground heaving is from the freezing, and moisture. That may be a key part to remember. That area is holding moisture.

any green is all cold season grasses, poa… essentially weeds. Your Bermuda or zoysia will not be green and will not be growing currently.

 

Did you get any results from the lab, you probably got some disease going on in that spot.

 

Yes. The results were posted earlier in the thread. They did not find any disease.

 

If its not disease, shade or nutrients then it must be not enough water somehow.

 

Increasing the amount of water (and doing it less frequent vs. little water over a number of days) was the recommendation. I was watering every other day vs one day of deep watering. I will make the adjustments this spring to see how the lawn reacts to it (and post pictures of the process).

 

You are sure it wasn't grubs or some other bug right? Grubs can be on one spot only.

 

I performed the soapy water test and there were no signs of them in the lawn. I looked up symptoms of grubs and there are more birds on my lawn than before.

Maybe I will treat the lawn with insecticide and see if anything happens.

 

I hope you figure it out

 

That’s insect damage. I’m not even 1% in doubt. Hit it with full rate aloft or arena and soak the crud out of it make sure you get at least half and inch of water on it immediately after applying. Not a week later immediately. It will still take months for it to regrow but this is insect.

 

Thank you for the information. I have Duocide and was planning to apply in April and again in August.

Is Duocide just as effective as Aloft or Arena?

 

If it was in my neck o the woods that would appear to be bill bug damage (nocturnal feeders you will never see them) or chinch bugs which you would need a 20x to see. Aloft or arena will kill both. But again you’ve got 5 days from app to water the heck out of it specifically at last 1/2 inch of water. A passing rain won’t work. And you need to treat the entire lawn otherwise they will spread. Just my .02 but what do I know?

 

Not familiar with it so give me a moment and I’ll look and the ai in that.

 

Thanks. It's by Andersons (

DuoCide® Insect Control

Eliminates pests both above and below the lawn's surface with a single application. Contains two professional-grade insecticides. Patented DG Technology.

andersonshomeandgarden.com

)

Also, should I apply it now? I was looking at a Bermuda calender and it mentioned April to treat grubs/insects but if I can apply it now I will do it.

 

I forgot about this product once I started looking at it I knew it was familiar! First, nothing wrong at all with the product. A quick backstory to make this make sense. I use 2 main chem warehouses. One I use for 90% of what I buy the other about 10% and the 10% wants a lot more of my business. 10% warehouse is a lot more expensive in just about everything but especially aloft than my 90% warehouse. The manager there early last year tried to sell me on duocide as an alternative for aloft or arena. Now this all comes back to mind. I ran the numbers, but I am more concerned about effectiveness and length of control. I’d have to use 2x the amount of duocide to get the results of aloft or arena (btw the only difference net those is one has a little bifenthrin in it which is a contact killer and not a systemic). Nothing wrong with it. It will probably work per directions. So long story no so short you will spend more on duocide than aloft or arena. Maybe up to twice as much more. But both should work if watered in per directions.

 

What zone are you in or if you prefer where are you that will tell me the when. I’m zone 7 and yes you don’t want to drop it down until approx April 15 here. Otherwise the critters are too deep even if you water per direction it won’t reach them to kill them. More to it than that but yes if around zone 7 wait until mid April otherwise you are literally throwing money away.

 

I am in Snellville GA (I belive it is zone 8a).

This is great information..thank you so much!

 

You are a tad warmer than we are so imo on April 1st id letter rip!

 

Will do. Thank you once again and I will update the thread to show the progress.

 

You should kill that poa while your Bermuda is dormant. There's no way the Bermuda will thrive with all that poa / weeds in that area. If the area is typically shaded during the growing season then try to cut some limbs while the trees are dormant to open up the canopy. As for the soil. You seem to believe that soil is the problem. Soil is rarely the problem for Bermuda. Bermuda will thrive on a concrete driveway without competition. Throwing down a lot of expensive unproven magic products (humic, liquid aeration, organics (work but are very costly for similar results as inorganics), etc) isn't going to fix the issue. The issue is often water, light, temperature, weeds or fungus/disease pressure, nitrogen, then soil structure and nutrition (non-nitrogen) in that order. Golf course greens are 95-99% inorganic sand, I can assure you your natural soil is better than that.

Based on the analysis you posted, your problem was watering too frequently and shallow. They also said you might have a potassium deficiency but I would defer to a valid lab soil test before accepting that since they didn't mention conducting one as part of their analysis. The water never made it deep enough to encourage deeper rot growth and and often caused fungal growth. You should be watering only once a week in Georgia, twice if its over 100 outside. I'm in Texas, I don't water more than twice a week. It's bad for your grass to water more often. Water it enough to ensure you put down an inch of water minus the amount of rain you got the prior week (That could mean up to 2 hours of watering per zone a week if your sprinklers aren't putting enough out or if your heavy clay soil won't accept the water). You can buy a soil sample rod to test how deep the water penetrates. It needs to go at least 6 inches deep. Your grass only needs an inch of water a week total. As for fungicide and insecticide. Just get a bottle of Bifenthrin XTS (apply it seasonally or bi-monthly if it rains a lot) and go get either a bottle of Propocanazole or Azoxy or both (apply them only as needed, up to monthly. And rotate them if the season / temperature allows, i.e. Prop cannot be applied above 90 degrees or itl'll damage the turf) Also don't over apply this stuff like others on this site seem to do (I only apply fungicides 2-3 times a year and my grass is fine). Put it down if the turf starts looking like its suffering from fungus. Read up on the different types of fungus for your turf grass and their seasons so you can spot them.

Don't waste your money on granular products like essential-G. Your soil has enough carbon and likely has enough nutrients to support the turf grass. You'd be better served getting a load of screened black dirt or compost delivered or getting your yard aerated yearly than buying expensive $60-$90 50 lb bags of soil and dumping them on your 2 million pound per 1,000 square foot x 6 inches lawn. You'd need at least 200 - 1000 bags of that stuff to make any difference and it would be small at best. Compaction is another thing that's over stated. Unless you're using your lawn as a golf course or walking over it a thousand times a week, your lawn is probably ok; though aeration, if you can afford it, is beneficial to the lawn. A soil test will tell you if the soil is lacking nutrients. Even if a deficiency is present in the soil the turf grass itself may still have sufficient amounts. You'll need to look at the turf grass itself to determine if a real deficiency is present. True potassium and phosphorous deficiencies are EXTREMELY rare in turf grass. So rare, they're rarely even seen in golf course greens in 99% inorganic soil environments in regions of the country with deficient soils. Don't use exchange bead soil tests (Mysoil, etc), get one done either using your local extension lab (typically a university) or a lab kit like soilkit.com (can buy at Home depot or directly from the site). Ignore the micronutrients, they do nothing for turf, focus on the macros instead (Nitrogen, potassium, phosphorous, sulfur, and to a lesser extent magnesium and iron). If you're truly worried about micros then buy some and spray them on the turf seasonally to bi-yearly. That will be plenty, probably overkill. If you want to learn more about soil go to youtube and watch a ton of videos from Turf Epistemology taught by Doctor Travis Shaddox. He'll really eliminate the BS you've been spoon fed by all the sales driven crap online. For instance, even if you have a potassium or phosprous deficiency, 1lb per 1,000 square feet is more than sufficient for an entire year, often half that amount is more than enough! Don't apply more than that as it can actually harm the turf. Don't try to build it up in the soil. Don't do any of that stuff.

And if you really want to take your turf to the next level, apply a pgr. That will make the turf healthier, greener, denser, slower growing / mowing less frequently, and more shade tolerant. But it can be a chore applying it monthly and then twice monthly during the summer (follow a growing day alert like this one: Growing Degree Days | GreenCast | Syngenta or calculator for best results). Get your turf healthy before applying PGR, or only apply it in the healthy areas of your yard until the grass is established. I recommend either going to the marketplace on this site and buying a quart to get started or going on Amazon and getting a gallon of Tnex. You can get a bottle of Primo but its a terrible value. Start light on the first couple of applications / aim for the bottom of the application range before increasing to the recommended amount for your turf type. Apply from March after the grass has been mowed once or twice and stop in the fall when it stops growing as much / before it goes dormant.

 

Thank you for the information. This is the lab results from my soil test.

 

And read and follow the Bermuda Bible: https://www.thelawnforum.com/thread...le-the-new-testament.1651/?post_id=30491&nested_view=1&sortby=oldest#post-30491

 

I will read the information in the link tonight

 

That information is basic and it's a quick read. But if you really want to learn about this stuff, you'll need to spend a few hours watching videos here: Turfgrass Epistemology. Some of the good videos are now members only but some remain publicly available.

- When soil tests come out, the BS flows

- The soil PH diagram

If you don't have time to watch the hour long videos then watch as many of the shorts on similar subjects like:

- Potassium soil levels

- You only need a little phosphorous

- Feeding the soil is a scam

 

I keep my customers Bermuda lawns or at least attempt to keep them around a 6.5pH. 5.8 ph imo is just a bit low. Not horrible. Raise it up about we’ll let’s just say half a point to a point and see what difference that little change will make. I’ve completely changed Bermuda lawns for the better just by getting them closer to around 6.5pH it’s actually remarkable how much better they do. That’s about 10x more alkaline than you are have.

 

Thank you for the great suggestions. I am taking notes and updating my calendar so that I can make the proper adjustments at the right time.

 

Don’t take me for the Bible of grass I’m just going by 30 + years experience you do you but I’m happy to give my 2 cents.

 

I will take your 30+ years over my 0 years of experience any day!