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Mossy Lawn recovery?

Hello All,

This may seem like a simple one. But hey. Here goes.

Initial Problem

I had a mossy lawn, the grass barely came through.

My resolution.(?)

I used a moss treatment then a scarifier. The treatment was heavy and did kill all the moss, but killed  most of the lawn too, leaving patches of dead grass and dead moss. 

Main problem!

The moss is gone, but it seems really hard to get grass seed to bed.

I've used patch magic, which seems to have good success but in small areas. I've tries grass seed, lots of watering, forking in holes but cant seem to get good coverage. The patches remain.

The places without patches are growing fantastically.

The engineer in me tells me to rip out the patches and replace with fresh soil and reseed.. but that seems aggressive. 

Any advice? 

Posts

  • I should say I have had some success with plastering the areas with PatchMagic, but its too expensive.. Im looking for a basic hows and whys and and advice before I buy more.

  • FairygirlFairygirl Posts: 55,117

    That's the problem if you're a bit heavy handed with a weed and feed product. It annihilates the weedy areas, and encourages rapid growth in the grass.

    Scarify and remove all the dead stuff, get some sieved topsoil down on all the bare areas, and apply some grass seed. Make sure it has proper contact with the soil, and also that it's watered well. It may be better to mix the seed with the soil instead of doing it separately too, as it prevents the seed being washed away when it's watered. If you've applied the product recently however, I'd leave it a few weeks ad just mow regularly for now, otherwise the weedkilling part will tend to prevent germination.

    Bear in mind that if the grass is basically mossy, it suggests there's a lot of underlying issues anyway. Usually shade and compacted, wetter soil, so you need to address that for the grass to succeed. Aeration of the soil with a fork will be a big help. image

    Last edited: 27 May 2017 03:03:25

    It's a place where beautiful isn't enough of a word....



    I live in west central Scotland - not where that photo is...
  • Have you thought about cutting the area out and replacing with a couple of rolls of grass?

  • BorderlineBorderline Posts: 4,700

    Is this lawn in shade? If not, is it in one area and not another? Also, if you have used some kind of weekiller for moss, you will obviously see lots of black sooty areas, this is expected, so scarify the areas with black moss.

    Moss indicates dampness, compacted soil and possible lack of sun. Any one of the three can cause moss.If you follow Fairygirl's advice and still see moss returning, then you might need  a special seed mix for shady lawns.

  • Thanks all for the suggestions. This makes sense, I've aerated more, and mixed the seed with soil.

    It was damp up to last year when we had the trees cut back. Its better now.  

    I think this mightt be the answer because the areas that grew better where moderately aerated as a test 2 or 3 weeks ago. 

    Great stuff, fingers grossed.

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