Grass dormancy & coloring

[umbo514]

I understand that different grass types stay greener and transition into dormancy differently. However, I noticed that certain sections of my lawn still look very green vs others are in a dormant stage. Looking at my notes, most of these green locations I applied an additional application of urea late in season, kind of as an experiment.

This might be too general of a question because of various grass types and environmental factors but are there know practices that can cause a grass to fall into its dormancy state later?

[gave20]

for me it's grass height; even though I use varieties designed for 2" mow heights anything below 3" makes the grass very yellow and cold winter temps exacerbate that condition. now i keep the lawn at 3" and I can maintain a good green color throughout winter regardless of winter exposure.

[BobL]

I've noticed both of these. My lawn always has a layer of yellow-ish grass low in the yard that doesn't really grow much. So when I cut short it looks more yellow, as that grass is visible. As the good grass grows, the green covers and hides the yellow underneath. In the Spring, just as growth is starting but before it gets heavy, I'll sometimes do 2 cuts 2-3 days apart to get down to 1.5" or so, and get the yellow stuff down to a minimum. That way, when I'm cutting at 2.5 for the Spring/3+ for the summer, they yellow never appears.

I have noticed that even the good green grass holds its color much longer into the winter since I started doing a final application after top growth stopped. It eventually fades a bit but is greener than surrounding lawns all winter long.

fwiw, some aggressive raking with a wire rake pulls up much of this yellow undergrowth. I rented a seeder once, which also had de-thatch/scarifying blades to prep for the seed, and it pulled up a ton of the yellow stuff. I'm just never motivated enough to spend hours aggressively raking or getting one of these - https://www.amazon.com/Sun-Joe-AJ801E- ... 427892 - which I suspect would churn it up on the lowest above-soil setting.