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I have 3 spots around my yard that has coarser & taller growing light colored blades than surrounding grass.

What could this be?

It could be poa trivialis, but hard to tell without close up shots.

Here you go - thoughts appreciated!

Does it grow taller/faster than the other grass?

PSU4ME wrote: ↑

June 28th, 2017, 7:24 am

Does it grow taller/faster than the other grass?

I think that's an affirmative from the first photos.

PSU4ME wrote: ↑

June 28th, 2017, 7:24 am

Does it grow taller/faster than the other grass?

Yes!
You can't clearly tell because of the length (7+days of not mowing now) & angle in some of the pictures.

Not sure from the picture but since you only have 3 spots, kill it now before it spreads! Or dig it out if you don't want to Round Up those areas.

nclawnguy wrote: ↑

June 27th, 2017, 10:40 am

It could be poa trivialis, but hard to tell without close up shots.

Could it be a form of sedge?
I'm starting to see the usual nutsedge pop in individual shoots in other spot & they are asppear to be lighter than the surrounding grass.

I know it's purely guesswork @ this point & maybe moot point since the weather is supposed to be in 90's for the next 7-10 days.

If the stem feels triangular then it is probably sedge.

I have the same thing in my lawn. Seems to happen every June. I initially thought it was sedge but the stems didn't feel triangular. The leaf blades are rolled toward the bottom but are flat near the top.

Leifcat1 wrote: ↑

June 29th, 2017, 10:38 pm

I have the same thing in my lawn. Seems to happen every June. I initially thought it was sedge but the stems didn't feel triangular. The leaf blades are rolled toward the bottom but are flat near the top.

Yep. June was when it appears. 2nd year in a row for me.
Started to see the typical individual nutsedge shoots around the yard.

But this issue are patches clumped together.

Leifcat1 wrote: ↑

June 29th, 2017, 10:38 pm

I have the same thing in my lawn. Seems to happen every June. I initially thought it was sedge but the stems didn't feel triangular. The leaf blades are rolled toward the bottom but are flat near the top.

I shot the 2 spots in pictures 2+3 in the first post with Sedgehammer last Sunday & nothing happen.
The 1st spot in picture 1 went away by itself in the 2-3 weeks where we got 95°+ weather.
While real 1-off sedges elsewhere in my lawn died off from the sedgehammer.

I applied some WBD CCO on top of spots 2/3 also & it did nothing also.

So now I'm thinking it's could be Poa Annua but I thought Poa Annua would have died with the hot temps.

Honestly, I think it could be a sign of heat stress in my lawn. This seems to happen to me when the temps get super hot exceeding 90 degrees. It also seems to happen to me during periods where there hasn't been much rainfall, forcing me to irrigate more often.

The temps here in Iowa have cooled down tremendously over the last few weeks and we've had a little more rain too. The light green blades in my lawn are starting to become less visible. Some spots have disappeared altogether. I've also lowered my mowing height from 3.5 to 3.0 inches. I don't know if that may have helped or not.

Just my own observations in my lawn. Your situation could be different from mine but I found that waiting it out worked best for me.

Thanks for the update!

This is tough... I took your photo and zoomed in really close, I noticed the lighter colored stuff is a single vein. Could it be some form of Rye? Rye would make sense for the faster growth rate and color compared to your Fescue, but how it showed up in random patches is a mystery.

I'm not ruling out Sedge quite yet, but my first reaction is that it was not Sedge. Perhaps it is a different type of Sedge than I have battled. Sedge would explain the spreading tendency of it. Here's the closeup where I observed the vein pattern:

poa triv is fairly easy to identify, now that i've learned how to:

it's roots are shallow, primarily stolons.
if you scratch the soil beneath it, and smell your finger, it should smell like poop.
and if you peel back the collar apart, the what remains will have a very easy to see pointed liguile:
http://www.turfgrass.ncsu.edu/images/Pl ... CN0665.jpg

i'd pull a small piece and get us some pictures of various parts of the plant. liguile, vernation, roots, etc...

if you scratch the soil beneath it, and smell your finger, it should smell like poop.

Not a great test if you're a heavy Milorganite/Bay State user

Or you just stuck your finger in dog poop.

PW405 wrote: ↑

August 5th, 2017, 5:04 pm

This is tough... I took your photo and zoomed in really close, I noticed the lighter colored stuff is a single vein. Could it be some form of Rye? Rye would make sense for the faster growth rate and color compared to your Fescue, but how it showed up in random patches is a mystery.

I'm not ruling out Sedge quite yet, but my first reaction is that it was not Sedge. Perhaps it is a different type of Sedge than I have battled. Sedge would explain the spreading tendency of it. Here's the closeup where I observed the vein pattern:

Impressive sleuthing PW405 !

You got me swayed to the possibility that it is not sedge esp. when the Sedgehammer had ZERO effect on these spots at all.

In the name of science, I have retrieved some sedge from my side yard. The color is a little darker than usual due to a recent app of Milo + Ironite, but you can see that Sedge has a fairly deep V shaped groove in the middle which is what gives it the "triangle" shape:

PW405 wrote: ↑

August 9th, 2017, 9:13 pm

In the name of science, I have retrieved some sedge from my side yard. The color is a little darker than usual due to a recent app of Milo + Ironite, but you can see that Sedge has a fairly deep V shaped groove in the middle which is what gives it the "triangle" shape:

So I was inspecting the 3 light color areas again today - after my most recent cut on Sunday - they are not coming back as strong as before. I have my mower on the highest setting.

Usually, by the 3rd day these areas are a clear head & shoulders above the other parts of the lawn.

What's odd is that they look like they've lost some of their green color as a group. Borderline yellowing....stay tuned.