[phil]

Hey everyone,

I recently got a lot of great advice about improving my lawn and with identifying some issues I have, but I came across a new issue just yesterday when I got home from work (check out the pics). For some context, I haven't done any insecticide this year, I have fungus issues and am about to apply a second fungicide app, and we just went from day after day of rain to three days of full sun and 80+ degrees. The issue looks like some sort of blight - the area that was super green and healthy looking just a few days ago now comes up like loose carpet. Someone mentioned poa trivialis with regard to a separate issue, but I don't know if this is the case here because this grass was thick, dark green, and healthy just a few days ago. Also, I don't see any grubs anywhere.

What do you think?

- Phil

 

[Roosterchest]

Is this all the same spot?

How confident are you in "no grubs"? Did you do a grub preventative earlier this year?

 

[phil]

All the same small area, but not exactly the same spot. I put grub control down in mid/late May when I saw a few on the far end of my lawn. Are you thinking it could be grubs? I can do another check tomorrow to make sure.

 

[Roosterchest]

Are you thinking it could be grubs?

That's where my mind goes because of how the grass just pulls up so easily. I had the same issue when I moved to our home a few years ago. I've had other issues with red thread, brown patch, etc., and none of those resulted in sod that came up so easily.

 

[phil]

I bought a large bag of Grubex today, but I also need to stay on top of my curative fungicide apps. I don't want to dump too many chemicals down and stress the lawn that much, but it looks like I have both issues. I don't know for sure if I have grubs yet though - I poked around a while ago today and couldn't find even one. With 20,000 square feet of grass it seems there's always something somewhere to deal with....

 

[LIgrass]

Grubs are mostly found in sunny areas, not so much in shade. If you didn't see any you should be fine in that regard. I believe 5-10 per sqft would be a problem if you do spot any.

 

[phil]

I wonder what that is, then. Those most recent pics don't look like poa triv to me, so I was thinking fungus. The only thing with that is that I've never seen turn come up like that from fungus.

 

[phil]

Well I pulled up some more larger sections of turf in the damaged areas to see if I could find at least one single grub, and I didn't find even one. The turf is pulling up like carpet in one area and in clumps in another. I'm going to continue with my curative fungicide apps and skip the grub control. I wonder if it's another insect issue? I applied an insecticide on Saturday so if this is some other insect problem hopefully that app will help.

With it approaching mid-August I'm considering just taking it easy with any more curative treatments for small areas. I think at this point I'm going to move forward with fall rake/fert/overseed in a few weeks and just spot spray the minimal weeds I have here and there.

On a separate note, I picked up some SedgeHammer and will experiment with that on the little bit of nutsedge I have.

 

[phil]

@LIGrass I did some reading online about poa triv and see that the only real way to selectively kill it is with Velocity which is eye-wateringly expensive. I may kill off the few patches of what I think are poa altogether and just reseed those areas. I think that might be the issue here because we had some sun and 85 degree weather for a little while - enough to start to kill it off I think.