|
| A little background.
New home construction, hyrdoseeded lawn with a fescue/kbg mix. Lawn was seeded early June, came in quick and looks great. I have been watering heavy, heavier due to summer and this heat wave. Yard initially was heavy woods/brush but is cleared with woods all around. The part with the fungus gets shade most of the morning til noon, then shade again from around 5 on. What I have is this. It looked like greyish fur, when I reached down to touch it it basically disappeared but under it was dead grass. I have an area about 10'x10' with maybe 8 small areas (about 5inch diameter) that have this. Here are some pics.
I am so worried I am going to lose my lawn. |
Follow-Up Postings:
|
| The images dont seem to be showing up. Here is a link to the images. http://db.tt/eXTjC0Lq |
|
| Those links don't work either, but without looking I can tell you June is perhaps the worst time to start a cool season lawn. Young grass is very susceptible to fungus, and high temps with lots of soil moisture is ideal for fungal development. Not a whole lot you can do, but you could apply a fungicide as you have about 2 more months of summer to deal with. |
|
| Im going to try some fungicide. I know June is not best, but new construction = MUD MUD and county ordinances and wife say no mud. So I had to put it down, if I can keep it going decent I will overseed in the fall. lets try these images, I moved them to a public folder. http://dl.dropbox.com/u/24676124/Photo Jul 02 7 47 14 A
M.jpg http://dl.dropbox.com/u/24676124/Photo Jul 02 7 47 45 A M.jpg |
|
| Ok, here ARE the pics ... any clue how to delete all my other attempts lol?
|
|
| Ok I give up, when I post it the url doesnt work. When I preview the images show fine, but when posted it they dont This works though http://dl.dropbox.com/u/24676124/Photo Jul 02 7 47 14 A M.jpg |
|
| Try again. |
|
| I think the names of my files had spaces and that was screwing it up, these just worked in the test forum.
|
|
| Eureka it was the spaces! So any clues of exactly what this is? |
|
| Looks like pythium blight, but there are other diseases that look similar to those pics. Does the grass turn dark blackish brown, like motor oil was spilled? If so then it's probably pythium aka grease spot. It could also be brown patch. Here's a good website with pics and descriptions of diseases, just click on the disease tab. http://www.turffiles.ncsu.edu/Default.aspx |
|
| After looking at the disease chart, it looks most likely to be pythium blight. It is currently confined to a small area, maybe 10 spots in a 20x20 area. I am going to flag that area, apply fungicide to that area and around it and see if it spreads outside that area. I will stop watering so heavy, and stop watering in the evenings. Hopefully I dont lose the entire lawn!! I realize I was overwatering and watering late, but with the temps around 100 I was trying to keep the grasses cool. It does get a lot of shade, so I suspect it was a perfect storm. |
|
| And its spreading :( .. woke up this morning and it has spread significantly. Starts out looking like white cobwebs, then turns black in a day and kills the grass under it.
|
|
| I will second what timeco said, pythium blight, since he helped me identify my same issue last year when I overseeded and had a solid 2 weeks of rain on my new grass. Timeco and others were very helpful and suggested this: You can find it at home depot and it worked for me to stop the spread. Not much you can at this point about the bare spots except try to remove the infected areas and overseed in the fall. My backyard seems to very susceptible to fungus since I have a tall fence fully enclosing my yard so air movement is hindered. I personally am going to try a regime of Corn Meal starting this fall. There are varying view points on whether this works in preventing lawn fungus but a lot of people appear to have had success with it. Better than a constant spraying of a chemical fungicide as this can not only get expensive but also kills the beneficial fungi in the soil. Since you say the problem is fairly shady compared to the rest you may have this issue in the future if not pythium blight then potentially brown spot, you can search the organic forum to see others opinions on natural fungal control. It has been two years in a row now for me with something and it becomes very frustrating when I start out with a lawn that gets praise from all the neighbors early in the season and then starts looking like crap by June. |
|
| ATekk, thank you and also you timeco. I will go to HD and pick some of that up and give it a try. My lawn also gets very little airflow and it is surrounded by dense woods. The yard itself gets sun but also has shady areas as we left two trees in the yard. I wonder if its beneficial to mow/bag? Would that "suck" the fungus off the grass? |
|
| ATekk, what is your watering schedule? Sounds like the OP knows he needs to stop overwatering and watering late. |
|
| Bag mowing won't "suck the fungus off the grass" but it will limit the spread of disease via infected leaf tissue. I bag mow most of the hot humid months as I don't want anything on the lawn that will contribute to the grass staying wet longer than it needs to be. Pythium usually affects young turf, once it's mature it's much less of an issue. The immunox that ATTek mentioned isn't indicated for pythium, but it can't hurt, and will probably limit spread. Heritage G is a great full spectrum fungicide that is indicated for pythium, but it's a bit pricey, although you can spot treat with it. |
|
| Should I bag mow first, then spray the fungicide? |
|
| Yes. |
|
| I water 1 inch once a week. Everything holds up fine until we have a week or more of non-stop rain at which time the grass continues to grow like crazy and I can't get in to mow. I never have an issue unless mother nature overwaters on me. |
|
| immunox is not labeled to work on plythium blight. the active ingredient, myclobutanil, will not stop plythium. here is nc states website for disease profiles, they list treatments at the end and how effective they are. http://www.turffiles.ncsu.edu/Diseases/Pythium_Blight.aspx |
|
| No new signs of fungus today, keeping fingers crossed! Been 3 days since it started, saw new areas each day. Bag mowed, sprayed immunox yesterday afternoon and no new today. |
|
| Glad to hear ssgumby. As jdo053103 stated, I know its not labeled to work against PB but I had the same experience as you. Was spreading like crazy, sprayed, and stopped in its tracks. After you reseed in the fall I would suggest looking at methods to stop it in the future if you have an area like mine that just seems it is perfect for fungus growth if natures conditions are right. As timeco said, Heritage G is great and works but gets very expensive. I am going to try the natural approach with cornmeal and will report back next year my results. Hoping for good luck as that would be a lot easier and cheaper to maintain (and its natural). |
|
| Ok, so on 7/4 it was looking like I had it contained. I think the immunox slowed it, but did not contain it. THe heat and humidity persisted and it came back vigorously by the 6th. I bought several bags of heritage-G, applied it at 3 lbs (lesco said 2-4 lbs and though 3 would be a good target. I applied this on 7/7, it halted it immediately, has not spread and some of the bad areas have started to fill back in. I have a second yard that was planted shortly after the first, its about 2 weeks younger. It is now showing signs of pythium so I will be applying heritage-g tomorrow here too. I will now be keeping heritage-g on hand for future use. The stuff is around $85 per bag, I have bought 4 bags but it was well worth it. Lesco told me pythium is running wild in this area and in fact were out of the heritage-g and I had to drive 45 miles to the next one to get mine. They said they've never seen a year this bad with pythium. So good news is ive salvaged my yard, my mud is covered and I will reload and reattack in the fall with some overseeding. Heritage-G is my fungicide of choice now! |
|
| Yes, Heritage G is one of the best, cures almost everything, lasts about a month, and is easy to apply. If you are planning on using it for more than one or two apps, you probably should alternate with a different fungicide that is in a different class than Heritage to prevent the fungi from becoming resistant. Eagle is another good one to look at, but not sure if it covers pythium. |
|
- Posted by nearandwest 7 (My Page) on Tue, Jul 17, 12 at 21:55
| Eagle is not labeled for control of pythium. I would recommend rotating Heritage G and Subdue Maxx for control of pythium blight. |
|
| Lesco did have another one for pythium, could have been subdue maxx, dont remember but ill find out for sure. Hoping the 1 month application will get me into some cooler nights! |
Please Note: Only registered members are able to post messages to this forum. If you are a member, please log in. If you aren't yet a member, join now!
Return to the Lawn Care Forum
Instructions
- You must be a registered member and logged in to post messages on our forums.
- Posting is a two-step process. Once you have composed your message, you will be taken to the preview page. You will then have a chance to review the contents and make changes.
- After posting your message, you may need to refresh the forum page in order to see it.
- It is illegal to post copyrighted material without the owner's consent.
- HTML codes are allowed in the message field only.
- No advertising is allowed in any of the forums.
- If you would like to practice posting or uploading photos, please visit our Test forum.
- If you need assistance, please Contact Us and we will be happy to help.