I just saw an article that said that dethatching a lawn is not good because the tines that rip up the thatch also damage the grass crowns. Attempting to grow most any grass in an area that shady requires a lot of work and means getting a shady grass seed, some of the Fescues can grow in a lot of shade. Talk with the people at your counties Rutgers USDA Cooperative Extension Service office about what choices you have but get the soil worked into a good,healthy soil so anything you do try there has a better chance of growing.

2. Water deeply and infrequently. Deeply means at least an hour in every zone, all at once. Infrequently means monthly during the cool months and no more than weekly during the hottest part of summer. If your grass looks dry before the month/week is up, water longer next time. Deep watering grows deep, drought resistant roots. Infrequent watering allows the top layer of soil to dry completely which kills off many shallow rooted weeds.

3. Mulch mow at the highest setting on your mower. Most grasses are the most dense when mowed tall. Bermuda, centipede, and bent grasses are the most dense when mowed at the lowest setting on your mower. Dense grass shades out weeds and uses less water when tall. Dense grass feeds the deep roots you're developing in 1 above. By mulching you help return fertility to the soil.

4. Fertilize regularly. I fertilize 5 times per year using organic fertilizer. Which fertilizer you use is much less important than numbers 1 and 2 above.
   

Here's the thing about thatch in northern lawns.
If you had thatch then you must have Kentucky bluegrass.
If you had thatch then the KBG must have been getting watered an fertilized too frequently.

Other than the possibility of thatch, KBG is the perfect grass for sunny areas. If your grass is doing well there now, then you must have enough sunlight. In the patches, perhaps you need some other grass. Hopefully someone will suggest some types of fescues. Fescue tolerates less light than KBG does. Color and grass blade matching (fine versus coarse) might be an issue or it might not. So to answer your question, yes, you should treat the shady and sunny areas differently. I water my front lawn once a week in the heat of summer. I have not watered my shadier back yard in a month (one rain since then). The "deeply" part is the same for both shade and sun, but the "infrequently" part must be determined for the environment, soil, grass type, etc.

Have you read the Organic Lawn Care FAQ? I don't use Milorganite because of the heavy metals content. I realize it (barely) passes the government allowances for heavy metals, but the organic fertilizer I prefer to use has undetectable amounts of metals.

dchall, I read in an earlier post about which fertilizer you use, but I can't seem to remember/find the post.

Which fertilizer do you use?

"If you had thatch then you must have Kentucky bluegrass.
If you had thatch then the KBG must have been getting watered an fertilized too frequently. "

Actually, some of the fine fescues tend to have thatch problems and I don't think they need to be overfertilized to get thatch (although it's easier to overfertilize them because they need much less than KBG or tall fescue).

Since the thatch was in the shady area, odds are fair that it's fine fescue.

A dispute! It would be good to see how much shade there is.

In a good, healthy soil the soil bacteria will digest any thatch that might accumulate, so if thatch does accumulate that menas there is a soil problem, the Soil food Web is not functioning properly. Thatch is dead grass plants that do not get digested and can happen in any type of grass. Thatch is not the clippings you get from mulch mowing.

I'd be happy to take a picture and supply a url to see it. That will happen tonight.

Also, this area was getting a 1/2 hour of water 3x per week!

AaaaaHA! The smoking thatch gun. If you could work your way back to watering 1.5 hours, one time per week the grass would like it better. You probably have very shallow roots from that watering schedule, so you cannot go cold turkey directly to once per week. Frequent watering and fertilizing contributes to thatch. When the weather cools, back off to watering every other week.

kimmsr is correct about what thatch is. I was reminded by that and in another topic about using molasses to help get rid of the thatch. Spray at 3 ounces per gallon to grow more of the microbes that decompose thatch.

I fertilize with ordinary corn meal and sometimes alfalfa pellets. This year I scored a huge haul of free organic fertilizer from a feed store that had a half a pallet unsold for 3 years. I'm going to have to fertilize every weekend to get rid of it!!!

Do you know how much water you get in 1/2 hour? Try measuring the water that goes down. The easiest way is to put some empty tuna (or cat food, or any other can, really) down around the area that the sprinkler is watering and measure the amount of water in the can.

You're generally better off watering less frequently and watering longer when you water. That way, you're encouraging deep root growth and also making it harder for weed seeds to germinate.

"You probably have very shallow roots from that watering schedule, so you cannot go cold turkey directly to once per week"

I haven't watered my lawn yet this year. I think I could start an "unaggressive" infrequent watering schedule now and slowly get more aggressive as the season rolls on.

"Deeply means at least an hour in every zone, all at once."

I do believe I can opt to water concurrent zones, but I do question if there is enough water pressure to achieve this. So, in order to get 1 hour in each of my 5 zones, I'm gonna have to start at 3AM!

bpgreen - I can def measure the amt of water, but is there a certain amount of water I should be aiming for?

Thanks everyone... I'm so glad that I found this group!

You should be aiming for an inch of water per week, preferably all at once. I have clay that wouldn't absorb water fast enough, so I set my sprinklers to run in cycles. I'd water for about 20 minutes each zone, then by the time all zones had finished, I'd repeat. I'd run through 3 cycles, so each zone got roughly 1 hour, but in three passes so it would have a chance to soak in. I actually start around midnight. Watering at midnight may cause problems in more humid areas, but it's dry enough here that I can water any time without being concerned about funcus.

One thing you could do is to water zones 1 and two on Monday, then zones 3 and 4 on Tuesday and zone 5 on Wednesday. That way, each zone gets the right amount all in one day.

I tried to get a decent pic of the shady parts, but its kinda hard. Check out link

Here is a link that might be useful: Backyard Photo

Another picture

Here is a link that might be useful: backyard photo 2

With that much shade, you probably want to go with a fine fescue mix. It will tolerate the shade a lot better than KBG will and it blends well with KBG so it won't look off where it transitions into the rest of the lawn.

Bonny dunes seems like a pretty good fine fescue mix. Here is another source.

I'm planning to use this mix in my back yard, but more for its low water use than its shade tolerance. It doesn't list the cultivars it uses, but I suspect Jasper Creeping Red Fescue, Durar Hard Fescue and Covar Sheep Fescue (I bought sheep and creeping red from them last year and got Jasper and Covar and they list Durar as a hard fescue).

If you buy something locally, try to get named varieties and stay away from Boreal Creeping Red Fescue. It looks like a named variety, but it's unimproved.

How large is your lawn? Do you have any Starbucks that you pass on a regular basis? Starbucks gives out used coffee grounds for free and they can be spread directly on the lawn as a fertilizer. It takes a lot to get enough nitrogen, so if you have a large lawn, it's not practical.

One thing to note is that fine fescues use a lot less N than KBG and you could have problems (especially heavy thatch) if you fertilize fine fescues as much as you do KBG. I think the recommendation is to limit nitrogen to somewhere between 1 and 2 lbs per 1000 sq ft per year (KBG uses 3-4 lbs per 1000 sq ft per year).

I agree. Fescue is probably what you have now, too.

I break the watering rules regarding time of day. I start watering at 8pm and go to 10 or midnight. It is humid here, too. I would not recommend that but it works for me. Our normal watering restrictions are that we can only water one day per week and only from midnight to 10am and 8pm to midnight. Yes that is a crazy system but it's ours. Seems to me that a more practical system would allow you to water one night per week, not one day per week. This way we have to water Tuesday morning and Tuesday night instead of Tuesday night and Wednesday morning.

I picked up some Scotts Dense Shade Mix a few weeks ago. It seems to be growing back there. I need to spot seed in the Fall. If the seed doesn't take this year, I'll try a different fine fescue mix.

My shaded lawn is in the 3000 sq ft area, so I'm not sure if I can pick up enough grounds to cover it all.

I am planning on picking up some alfafa pellets or soy bean meal this weekend for a late May fertilizing.

O and I'm proud to announce that this morning was my first "heavy" watering. I watered 3 zones for 1 hour each. I am not watering the backyard because it seems like its currently got enough moisture.

NJ has 5 distinct climate zones with different temperature and rainfall. You need to factor that into your lawn care. Depending where you are in NJ you may not even need to water your lawn until the summer unless you're trying to get seed to germinate.

Seedsuperstore.com has a tool called Seed Express that determines a good blend of grass seed for your zipcode. They're are probably cheaper places that sell seed but I like the tool.

Jonathan Green is from NJ and makes some pretty good grass seed. They have 2 different shade mixes.

Also keep in mind shady areas usually need less fertilizer and water.

I agree with you noob because we have gotten so much rain recently, I have only watered once thus far (as it pours again today).

Jonathan Green seed is sold at a nursery not 1 mile from my house. I'll check it out.

Just an update to all those people that care, I applied 15-20 lbs of soybean meal after Memorial Day and my grass is much improved in color and density.

I'm going to apply a Milorganite feeding (of 15 lbs per) in July to get me through the summer. I think the slow release and iron will be great over the summer.

Question: I bought one extra 50# soybean meal and I'm storing it in a garbage bag in a plastic storage container. I'm trying to avoid odor and the feeding of unwanted animals. Is this ok?