Fescue is a cool season turf. The further north you travel, the better it
looks. It’s designed to thrive in cooler
weather. So, it looks really nice in
Georgia and North Carolina during the fall, winter, and spring months. THEN, we get to summer. There is just no way fescue grass can
withstand the high temperatures and lack of rain during the summer. It will fade out due to heat stress or even
disease. Brown patch is a huge issue for
fescue turf. Post to come on that later.
The only way to replace the turf that dies
during the summer is to plant new grass.
The best way to replace these areas is to aerate the soil and then plant
new seed.
So……………..if you don’t plant new seed to replace the grass
that is dead due to heat stress and disease, you will have bare spots in your
lawn. You might have more than just bare
spots and not have any turf at all. We
at King GREEN always try to stress the importance of annual aeration and
seeding. This entry should explain why! There is no product that we can apply to make
your grass come back. It also didn’t die
because of any product we applied. It’s
simply because of the weather and environmental conditions and it has to be
replaced every year.
You may be thinking, ‘I don’t want fescue if I have to plant
new grass every single year!’ I
understand your sentiment, but fescue is the only grass that can thrive in a
shaded area. Sometimes Zoysia is
advertised as a shade loving sod. In
reality, it isn’t. Your options are
to keep fescue in the shade and overseed every fall OR remove trees and provide
sunlight that will support a sun loving turf like Bermuda or Zoysia. Even Bermuda & Zoysia need aeration
annually, but they don’t require seed, so it ends up costing less.
If you have any questions, post a comment here or send me an
email!
