Bit a of a newbie gardener. I laid a lawn in july, it looked great when first down and the strips seemed to knit together pretty quickly. I was giving it plenty of water a left it several weeks before cutting. Since then I've not been cutting it too short and have gving it water if it hasn't rained for a few days.
Anyway, the grass seems to be getting weaker, becoming brown in patches and if you grasp it it rips out really easily. Also, it's a small space and FULL of worms casts, which just seem to be killing off patches. It's also under an apple tree and a fair few leaves and apples fall on it, but I have been raking them off regularly too.
What am I doing wrong :( Any advice appreciated - woud like the lawn to last longer than a few months!
Or one of the many diseases. It's virtually impossible to diagnose problems remotely, without even a picture or complete information on the soil characteristics, how the soil was prepared and exactly what has been done to it since.
Assuming this is the UK, giving it some fertilizer if none has been applied in the last 6 weeks or so would be a good idea.
Your best bet might be to lift a section of turf that shows the problem and a good adjacent section and bring it to wherever you got the sod from. Or a good lawn/garden center in your area. Ask them what they think the problem is.
Thanks for the replies and advice, I have been slowly giving it more water less frequently, and watering it first thing AM which I wasn't doing before.
I'll also try fertiliser, it was laid on a inch or so thick bed of top soil with some additional lawn fertiliser we bought from the turf company. However, I've not given it any since then.
You may have a few of issues here and as has been said before it is very difficult diagnose the exact issue without inspection.
You may have watered to much initially resulting in shallow rooting, you need to "starve the roots a little" so that they need to grow deeper to get to the water.
The fertiliser you applied before laying the turf needed to be a pre-turfing fertiliser, if not and it was a ordinary lawn fertiliser and it was applied to heavily this could have caused areas to die back.
However hindsight is a wonderful thing and as you cannot go back lets look at what you can do now:-
Have you got a grub issue? There is a possibility that you have had or still got a few chafer grubs or leather jackets in the lawn, there insects eat the roots of the grass causing it to die. you can test if this is the case by grabbing the grass and lifting it. If it moves away from the soil easily it is a good sign that the root structure has been attracted. But then you need to visibly identify the insect in order to be sure this is the cause, you will find further info about these two blighter's at:
'Lawn*Pests | Lawnscience' (
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Fertilisation You need to fertilise the lawn. Use a Autumn fertiliser, which should be rich in POTASSIUM as this will help to develop the roots over the Autumn/winter period. A good example would be Rigby Taylor's Bioplex
3:1:21, you can order it online at:
'Bioplex 3:1:12 Fine Turf Fertilizer and Biostimulant - Rigby Taylor' (
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Worms Worms are great for lawns as they help keep the soil in good condition, but they can cause issues when the cast of the surface, this can be prevented by using a chemical treatment, but you would only get this done by a qualified lawn technitian, see my last article 'Worms, moles and your*lawn | News | Lawnscience' (
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Finally if the lawn is dying off on patches now is a great time to repair by "patching in" turf, but don't leave it too late get it done now.
If I can give any furtehr help give me a call 01908 504664 or visit 'Lawn treatment and services by Lawnscience. Lawn maintenance and care.'
The lawn was put down 3 months ago. Any issue with the fertilizer used would have occured back then, when he said the lawn was doing fine.
It takes a lot more than a few grubs to kill a lawn. A few per square foot are normal. If he has a dozen, then yes that's a possibility.
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I agree a Fall fertilizer should be higher in potassium. But the lawn needs nitrogen too to stimulate growth and the above product is totally inadequate in that regard. Unless he wants to put down multiple products, I'd use something like 24-3-12, which is typical for a Fall fertilizer product.
spraying chemicals around to kill earthworms. In fact, everyone else is concerned about using pesticides to kill other insects because one of the problems is that those pesticides also kill earth worms. You think earthworms are killing this guys lawn?
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