Drought Stress or something else?

Kentucky bluegrass, Fescue, Rye and Bent, etc
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Adam_M
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Drought Stress or something else?

Post by Adam_M » September 29th, 2019, 10:57 am

Hi,
I'd appreciate the forum's suggestions to the photos/scenario below.

I started the aggressive fall regimen the week after labor day, but stopped the N 3 weeks ago as I was going to be out of town for a couple weeks. Temperatures were unseasonably warm (~80-85) for basically the entire past few weeks and little appreciable rain fell. I came back (last weekend) and saw what looked like thirsty grass, so I gave it a drink. It became quite evident my sprinklers (manual, unfortunately) are out of whack, but I'll work on that later.

One of my concerns is it seems like the wrong color for drought-stressed grass - the color is warmer and not as light tan, but it doesn't feel crispy like the previous fungal infections I've had.

I have a small area where I has sod cut/reinstalled with sprinklers on timers and the grass bordering it that has had an abundance of water shows no signs of this.

Questions:
Is this simply drought/water stress induced by the relative lack of water and the high(ish) N dose the grass saw early this fall?

How should I proceed?

Thanks,
Adam
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KBGkicksazz
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Re: Drought Stress or something else?

Post by KBGkicksazz » September 29th, 2019, 1:31 pm

That orange tint is usually indicative of fertilizer burn

Maizan24
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Re: Drought Stress or something else?

Post by Maizan24 » September 29th, 2019, 4:00 pm

Did you water in the fertilizer enough?

Adam_M
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Re: Drought Stress or something else?

Post by Adam_M » September 29th, 2019, 7:59 pm

I ran the sprinkler the right time to put down .25 inches of water, but didn't have tuna cans out, so it's entirely possible it didn't get watered in enough. Suggestions on how to nurse it back to health?

KBGkicksazz
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Re: Drought Stress or something else?

Post by KBGkicksazz » September 30th, 2019, 6:30 am

Water.
Adam_M wrote:
September 29th, 2019, 7:59 pm
I ran the sprinkler the right time to put down .25 inches of water, but didn't have tuna cans out, so it's entirely possible it didn't get watered in enough. Suggestions on how to nurse it back to health?


Adam_M
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Re: Drought Stress or something else?

Post by Adam_M » September 30th, 2019, 1:19 pm

Sounds good. I assume a continued pause of the N is in order until recovery?

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Re: Drought Stress or something else?

Post by KBGkicksazz » September 30th, 2019, 6:59 pm

Use your eyes. That’s a hefty burn. Not sure when your frost and final growth normally is but I’d suggest no more fert this year and keep up the watering and let the lawn recover.
Adam_M wrote:
September 30th, 2019, 1:19 pm
Sounds good. I assume a continued pause of the N is in order until recovery?

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Re: Drought Stress or something else?

Post by PSU4ME » September 30th, 2019, 7:14 pm

were you doing 1 pound of urea per thousand sqft? if so, thats a heck of a lot of burn even if you didn't water it in at all.

Adam_M
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Re: Drought Stress or something else?

Post by Adam_M » September 30th, 2019, 9:58 pm

I put roughly 1/3 bag on about 15k square feet so I should have been about .5lb of n per k and watered that in with what should have been .25 inches of water.

My pH is high and the grass was lacking color so I dropped Milo at bag rate a few days after the urea to get some iron in the grass (right before I left - no water added)

It seems likely that a number of errors were compounded to a whole lot of burn. I have a line in my spreader at 17 lbs of the brand of urea I use. Perhaps the prill size changed or I poured imprecisely and put too much down compounded with the bit of fast release N in the Milo. Add unseasonable heat and no water for a couple weeks and this is the result.

This is year 3 on the fall regimen and the first time I've burnt the yard. Lessons learned.

The rain today helped. It's greening up a bit.

Adam_M
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Re: Drought Stress or something else?

Post by Adam_M » October 27th, 2019, 1:41 pm

It's pulling through OK - there was minimal kill but it was really unhappy. I'm watching the yellow patch in the middle carefully, but considering putting down the winterizer dose after top growth stops if it keeps recovering and greens up a bit more (should be around thanksgiving based on the past few years). It's growing fine in that spot - the top growth is just slightly lighter, and its obviously still working on recovery though, especially down low. Does the collective wisdom of the board think that's OK based on the picture or am I pushing it too hard?

As an FYI, it hasn't seen fertilizer since the dose that burnt it.

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