Homeowners across the Upper Cumberland facing brown lawns as temperatures stay hot, but local experts said you do not want to give up.
Fentress County Director UT Extension Agent John Gunter said your yard’s long-term health is at stake. Gunter said maintaining a lush yard typically requires approximately one inch of water every week.
“You should be able to if you weather the storm over the next couple weeks,” Gunter said. “I’m hopefully we have rains typically start coming in a little bit more consistent. Cooler night temperatures will eliminate a lot of the stress on our cool season grasses and you should be able to at typically most of the time that grass will bounce right back.”
Gunter said cool season grasses like tall fescue and bluegrass naturally go dormant when temperatures exceed 75 degrees for more than five days. He said this dormancy often allows summer weeds such as crabgrass and goose grass to become the only green vegetation visible in local yards.
“This is a really important time of year because our yards they get stressed with drought,” Gunter said. “You’ll start to see those leaves rolling on the blades and you’ll start to see footprints in your yard which you normally wouldn’t see.”
Gunter said homeowners should avoid cutting more than one-third of the grass blade at a time. He said keeping grass at a height of four to six inches helps maintain a healthier lawn and reduces the density of weeds.
“I think a lot of times you’ll have people that just really think they haven’t mowed unless they scalp their yard,” Gunter said, “Scalping your yard like that increases the weed density. I mean you’re going to have more weeds. It’s you know you stress the plant.”
Gunter said irrigation should be performed exclusively in the early morning or late evening to prevent water loss through evaporation. He said applying water during the heat of the day is ineffective because high soil temperatures send the moisture back into the atmosphere.
“If you overwater the night especially if you’ve got a really thick nice lawn overwatering can sometimes lead to fungal problems in our summer perennials like Zoysia and bent grass and St. Augustine Bermuda and if you have a nice yard like that then you need to just kind of temper that water and to where that you’re not obviously running that sprinkler the sprinkler system all night long,” Gunter said.
Gunter said residents should utilize soil tests from their local extension office to determine exactly how to amend their yards for the spring. He said applying nitrogen fertilizer without immediate rain or irrigation can lead to the grass burning.
Gunter said residents should also inspect their property for fall armyworms, which can be identified by pouring warm soapy water over green patches to see if the pests surface.
Gunter said October is the ideal time to aerate and seed to increase the density of cool season grasses.
