Here's How You Can Bring Your Dying Lawn Back To Life

No, it is not time to take an extra long soak in the bathtub, it's time to help your ratty lawn bounce back to life. Also called magnesium sulfate, Epsom salts were first discovered in 1618 in a town called Epsom in England when a farmer noticed that his cows were quickly healing from shallow wounds after wading through salty water that they refused to drink. Can Epsom salts be just as good for your grass as they can be for your sore muscles? Maybe.

If you want to be sure that Epsom salts will help, get your soil tested for magnesium and sulfur deficiencies, as those are the two nutrients the salts will increase. In turn, Epsom salts can improve soil quality and give your grass a nice and even bright green color. They can basically be used as a lawn fertilizer; apply in spring by mixing 2 tablespoons of salt with 1 gallon of water. Or, use a spreader to apply the salt directly to the grass at a rate of three pounds for every 1,250 square feet (via the Epsom Salt Council), and then turn on your sprinkler system and let it do the dissolving.

You can figure out if you've got a problem with grubs by digging a few inches below the surface of a dead patch on your lawn and looking for them. Grubs are white and close to an inch long, and you'll find them curled up like little clams. A few grubs here and there should not be a problem, but if you have an infestation then you'll need to take action because they can be responsible for quite a lot of damage. Choosing an effective insecticide is not as simple as heading down to the garden center and grabbing a product off the shelf. The appropriate formula will depend on what time of year it is and what stage of life the grubs are at.

Some insecticides prevent grubs, some combat an ongoing issue, and some don't contain the right chemical formulation to do much of anything in regard to grub control. It's always a good idea to contact your local extension service for expert guidance. Once you're sure you have the right product for the job, pull on some boots and gloves, carefully apply the chemicals to the grass, and then water your lawn so they seep into the soil and really go to work for you. 

Water, water everywhere. The internet is full of advice on how best and when best to water your lawn. When it gets hot for a long duration throughout the summer months it makes sense to think you should turn on the sprinklers quite often. We're supposed to drink a ton of water ourselves, so what's the difference? It may go against our gut intuition, but when it comes to grass it's actually better to water less frequently but with a higher volume of water each time you do it.

A daily shallow spritz only serves to cover the grass in moisture that can lead to disease, and often a lot of that water evaporates during the heat of the day, meaning it gets wasted before it can be absorbed. Instead, give your grass a long, deep drink to allow enough water to seep down through the soil to the roots. Ideally, you want the soil to be evenly wet 4 to 6 inches below the surface. This will seem like a lot of water the first time you do it, but since you'll turn on the sprinklers less often it will even out.

Tired of raking up endless piles of leaves? If you've been waiting for a reason to skip this mundane chore, we've got good news for you: You don't really have to do it. In fact, raking might actually be hurting more than it's helping, so put the rakes and the paper bags and the oversized gardening gloves back in the shed and just pull out the lawn mower. The goal here is to turn the dying leaves and other decaying plant matter into mulch that will re-feed the grass. Any standard mower should be able to get the job done, but there are specifically engineered mulching mowers if you need a more powerful machine.

Clearly, fallen leaves are the key ingredient here, so this is a process you're going to employ come autumn. If your yard contains a lot of deciduous trees, and therefore a lot of falling leaves, double check that your mower blade is at the highest setting (which it should be anyway, right?). Over time the chopped-up leaves will break down and turn into natural fertilizer for the lawn. If you have excessive amounts, you can bag it to spread over other areas of the yard or garden for the same purpose.

Are you trying to plan a barbecue or graduation celebration and your heart sinks when you look out the kitchen window to the mud hole that has become your backyard? You might be at a point where you've got too many dead spots and you simply don't have time to wait for seeds to flourish or chemicals to do their job. In that case, it's probably time to consider laying down large patches of pre-grown sod. This is a project unto itself, requiring a fair amount of prep to ensure the sod grows well. It's not quite the shortcut many people think, but you'll have it done in a weekend and be thrilled with the gorgeous results.

To ensure you're properly installing sod, start by using a rototiller on the soil to remove rocks and incorporate organic matter. Then use a rake to even out the surface. The process of laying out the rolls will be similar to installing laminate flooring or vinyl planks. Stagger the edges of each piece to avoid gaping seams and push them together so there's no space between them. You'll need a sharp knife to cut edges when you meet a tree trunk, and a lawn roller will come in handy for evenly packing everything tight, which will encourage the young roots of the sod to grow down into the existing soil.

Thatch is a layer of debris that forms between blades of grass and the soil beneath. If it gets too thick it will pool rain water above the surface and turn your lawn into a mushy mess. This leads to shallow roots, grass that cannot handle any degree of drought, and issues with fungal diseases and pests. A thick layer of thatch will also prohibit fertilizer from penetrating down to the roots and potentially suffocate an otherwise healthy lawn. Proper mowing, aeration, and mulching of grass clippings should prevent thatch, but if you've already got too much of it, you'll want to get rid of it.

Dethatching is sometimes called power raking; a power rake looks a lot like a lawn mower except that it has rake tines underneath it instead of rotating mower blades. You can adjust the height of the rake tines depending on how deep into the grass you need to go in order to pull away the built-up thatch. Power raking can be done in either spring or fall. The machine will pull up the debris and then you'll need to hand rake it to collect and remove it.

Oftentimes a DIY weekend spent tending to common yard issues is plenty to bring a dying lawn back to life, but it helps to recognize that there's also a laundry list of potential diseases that homeowners may not be able to tackle on their own. Have you heard of gray snow mold or necrotic ring spot? How about crown rot anthracnose or microdochium patch? This isn't a pop quiz to see how much you've learned so much as a reminder that, even when we do all the things we're supposed to do, we can still find ourselves dealing with bare patches and unhappy grass.

Figuring out exactly which type of bacteria or fungus is attacking your grass might best be left to the professionals, who will perform an assessment and take samples for testing. They'll know what questions to ask in order to reveal all of the potential symptoms, and they'll be better equipped to choose the right remedy. For example, there are different species of turfgrass, and just like any other plant, some perform better in different climates. It could be possible that your lawn is primarily made up of a cool season grass when you would do better with a warm season grass. But at the end of the day, we can't all be expected to know that!