Lawn is 'Enviroturf' from Turfmaster Sod farms in nearby Ft. Collins.

3" top soil put down

Sprinkler system. Watered 1.5" per week. Dead areas not in particularly dry or wet parts (i.e. where heads don't overlap as well as they maybe should or where they really do overlap extra well).

Description : Patches that started to go from a good green to a 'dark green' but dry. Then turned brown and essentially disappeared. (rub it with foot and brown grass disintergrates down to dirt. Patches are in a long line on one side. a few patches here and there.

Does not pull up easily (as I've read grub damage should). No noticable mold or other discoloration at soil or on grass. Soil at roots looks 'reasonably' but I just dug in with finger.

I do keep the grass long (as long as my mower can cut it).

There are some kind of bug flying up when I walk around. But they are everywhere. I imagine that is is just because the grass makes a nice home. I don't think they are doing the damage, but maybe?

Also it is a new built. Lot might have been treated with weed killer, but then pushed around. Plus 3" of topsoil. But maybe the grass just now found the weedkiller in the ground?

Thanks for any help!

Tom

We are having the same problem as you. At the beginning of Spring our yard was so beautiful and green and stayed that way until about two weeks ago we started noticing the patches. We do have lawn service and when the home was built about a year ago we had the sprinkler installed so it is watered about an inch a week. We had the lawn company come out and do an assessment and was told we had Chinch Bugs. They spray the yard with a fertilzer mixed with insecticide.

We cut our grass 4 inches high. I am in Virginia.

We are hoping the treatment will work.

Has anyone ever heard of Chinch Bugs?

I amended my yard with over 60 yards of aged manure and rototilled it to 5-6" ...

I've been wonder if it could be insects, just the dry, windy conditions with no rain or perhaps a soil ph imbalance.

I talked with the company I bought my sod from. I'm going to email pics, but he feels very strongly that it is water related. I am starting to believe that since I dug around and couldn't find any critters to signs of critters as described on the CSU lawn site. I also noticed that I hadn't extented the time on the 2nd of the two zones I use for watering that section (an oversight). So I was water about 1" per week, rather than the 1.5" I though I was and that area is effected the most by this. Also, it appears the issue is under the areas where I dug the trench for the sprinkler piping, so maybe it is draining too much there.

So, I'm going to increase watering and see if it helps.

Someone mentioned a special fertizer for drought stressed lawns. Any idea what that would be?

Tom

To reduce the insect populations on your turf at or above the soil surface you can use an old vacuum cleaner to vacuum up the insects.

The link to the page is below, which covers other insect problems in grass.

I'm about convinced its some kind of insect, so I'm probably going to apply something to my backyard and see if that helps. I'm getting desparate, as my lawn is almost more dead than alive at this point and looked like a golf course the last 2 years and even a couple months ago!

Something is killing my lawn off and its not a shortage of water ... I'm dumping over 22,000 gallons a month on it ... and it still looks dead.

I've also manually plug aerated some of the worst areas to see if that helps.

Looking at some of the dead areas, its not just brown grass, its really dead looking, down to the roots. I've pulled up sections to look for insect damage ... and I don't see any bugs anywhere.

I did apply a pretty strong "super green" fertilizer this spring that had a pretty high nitrogren number on the label.

Could it be that this fertilizer did this somehow, even though it was apply early in the spring, during the fairly cool period.

You can get Necrotic Ring spot and fairy Ring.

Are there mushrooms growing (when wet) in circles?