Mossy / Weedy / Threadbare Lawn

spluff

spluff

spluff

Soldato
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19 Oct 2002
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I am looking for some green fingered help plz :)

I have a large back garden (aprox 400m2) which has moss in different areas some of it very thick. Also a lot of clover.

The grass is also looking very threadbare and will need over-seeding I think.

I am just wondering when is the best time of year to do this
What order to do things so I can get rid of the moss / get rid of weeds/clover / grow some new grass






Thank you
SpLuFF
 
I feel your pain, I have about 1000sqm of lawn generally in worse conditions than yours!

Sulphate of Iron and a rake/scarifier for the moss. It will be bare so be prepared to sow/water/protect.

You can used a broad lawn weedkiller for the clover. I use Dicophar for mine but Weedol or similar will work.

spluff said:
I am just wondering when is the best time of year to do this
Click to expand...

September is a really good time to do pretty much anything lawn related:

4CsZPet.jpg
 
That calendar is very useful thank you - I will keep it...

I was wondering which jobs I should do in what order then as I presume I will need to sort the weeds out and the moss before I overseed? (or do I wait until next year for the clover and weeds?)

Would this be a plan? :-

3 in 1 Moss/Weed Killer be better to tackle both - I already have some? (depending on if its going to rain in next week or so!) - September Hopefully!

OR Sulphate stuff and what you recommended (but I would need to buy both)

Scarify the dead moss after it goes black - A week or so after 3 in 1

Then throw some seeds down in - October time looking at calendar (and you need to leave it 4 weeks or so if applied weed and feed I think)

I want to do it correctly to hopefully give the lawn a chance to recover and dont want to waste my time :)

(would I need to scarify other parts of lawn which has no moss and just thatch to put seeds down - if so ive got a huge job)

Thanks
 
I had similar
First year I just concentrated on raking out (that was last year)
It helped a bit more grass to grow

This year I started with weekly raking, then I lawn weeded and feeded, and finally sewed seed in May before I went on hols in June.
I have a pretty strong grass patch now. I used a seed mix designed for low light, we have quite a shaded lawn in the winter and this is when teh moss takes over

Also, dont cut too short ifyou have moss, grass is a plant and if the moss is the same height as the cut grass then the grass struggles to compete for light.

I now need to work a bit more on levelling, will probably add a little seed to the low areas before i cover with soil.

I have used a scarifier in the past and thats way easier than raking, but you can end up with virtually a flat mud patch, where as if you rake, and keep raking your allowing the grass thats there to compete with the moss as you slowly open it up.

I have weeds again now, they will keep coming back via seeds.
 
I found with my lawn that prepping it first, but then putting weed 'n' feed down helped. I then waited a couple of days and mowed the grass but left the box off the back of the mower so the treated grass was left on the lawn. With the rain etc it then mulched down and doubly treated the rougher parts that weren't as luscious and green. I then repeated the process as required. Now the garden is an even green colour throughout, with a lot less weeds.

My main problem is my neighbour but one doesn't give a flying **** about her garden and so all the rubbish in her garden blows around and affects everyone else's. A garden proud neighbour has apparently had heated words with her about it, but it didn't go well and they no longer speak as a result :rolleyes:
 
Ive just had a quick raking and its a pain :)

There seems to be a lot of dead long yellow grass shown when raking but doesnt rake....

Is it dead grass? What do you do with it? How do I prevent that happening :)


 
Get some hens, they will scratch out all the moss for you. only trouble is then they scratch out all the grass too, and then the holes appear from them digging out a dust bath.
So your lawn may end up looking like a WW1 battle field but there will be no more moss.
 
Its a different type of grass.

Our gardener at work does that, rakes it up one day, then cuts the next. Its compacting, and you dont want it compacting, you want light to get into the area so it feeds the grass you want.

That grass again works like the moss and smothers the grasses we want to grow.
Your just going to have to fight a battle. If its really bad then you could be better off starting from scratch, for me not an option, (our cat likes to dig holes!) but it could be for you

One thing to mention is if the area you have has got issues, such as bad drainage, or light etc even if you re do the lawn you will end up in the same place with no maintenance.
Look carefully at the options for grass seed, if you keep adding the ones that suit your area you should do well as you are adding the ones that will thrive.

I overseeded our lawn with ones designed for low light and they do really really well. Its not going to give a bowling green type finish, they are a little courser but its far nice to have actual grass than in the shady areas it being 90% moss.
 
I got the exact same problem
absolute PITA



kind of holding out until we've finished using the garden for parties/birthdays then i'm going to rake it all out

I did apply 3 in 1 feed about 7 weeks back and it looked good for a while now i see yellow patches again.
I think my ground needs draining too like aerating

what kind of rake are u using for this? I was thinking... rake...... aerate and then reseed
is that the right way around?
 
Maintaining a nice lawn year round is requires a lot of effort, time and patients. It really depends on how much you want to commit.

Mercenary Keyboard Warrior has got some useful info regarding moss. Identify the underlying cause. Moss itself grows well in damp and shady areas so tackling that would be your first step. Otherwise whatever 3-in-1 product (which I don't personally use or would recommend) you use on it is a bit of a waste of money and masking the issue.
 
I agree, I dont see the point killing moss with 3 in 1 if thats going to be all you do. Sooner or later it will be replaced with new moss.
I didn't find dead moss any easier to remove than living moss, actually I would probably argue the living moss was easier to rake out as it has more "substance" to it.

My efforts so far have been little and often. I found 15 mins each weekend for a month was far easier to stomach with raking early spring, then the other work than trying to go all out for a weekend.
I also find repeatedly going all in means you can get annoyed and give up, I see it constantly at the allotments where people go mental for a weekend then you dont see them again for months or ever. Those of us who carry on seem to be pretty much the ones who do an hour or two frequently.
Plus little and often mean't I was able to put more effect into the areas that needed more and less into those that didnt. Was interesting to see how some seemed to react far more quickly than others. I guess probably now as some were so low on grass they couldnt react quickly, where as those competing better were more able to react, so it was easier to rake them far more to get more moss and dead thatch out.
 
The nature of a feed and weed or a 3-in-1 is a little illogical.

In the product you have nitrogen which is the macronutrient used to boost health, vigor and promote growth. Mixed in in the very same packet or bottle is a herbicide that is used to kill the plant. As it's an all in one, you have no choice but to blanket treat the area so you end up applying fertiliser where it isn't needed (i.e. bare patches with weeds and moss) and applying herbicide on good sections of your lawn.
 
spluff said:
Ive just had a quick raking and its a pain :)

There seems to be a lot of dead long yellow grass shown when raking but doesnt rake....

Is it dead grass? What do you do with it? How do I prevent that happening :)
Click to expand...
You are going to need to rake the hell out of it and it will look bad for a while.

That brown stuff is rhyzomes if I remember right, which is how grass moves about. You need to rake the dead grass (thatch) that is under the green grass, moss and other plants that arent grass and then I would reseed and spread fine compost over the top and water often. Either around now or at the begining of spring but it will be a lot of work to get it good and then maintenance to stop it getting like that again.

Great thread by @chipperhead about making a new lawn but sadly the photos have gone. Im sure he had one about renovation/maintenance aswell before that thread but I can find it in my bookmarks.

https://forums.overclockers.co.uk/threads/chipperheads-guide-to-creating-a-new-lawn.18503387/

Here we go the renovation one

https://forums.overclockers.co.uk/threads/chipperheads-guide-to-lawn-renovation.18012554/
 
Last edited:
Also.
Kermit said:
Gave up trying to manually rake dead (after treatment) and live moss from my lawn and this evening purchased a lawn scarifier from Screwfix. Its amazing how much it pulls up that I could barely touch with a rake. I'm haappy I've bought it but now unhappy I'll have to wait a number of weeks to see any improvement

Pic #1 Halfway through. I set it to medium and while I'm sure there's more moss and thatch in there so I'm also thinking not to overdo it and fix it up in stages (or perhaps autumn) so my lawn recovers quicker to allow Badminton to continue asap. As per Screwfix reviews on the scarifier I bought, I ran it without the small collection box which fills up too very quickly.
rnhF579.jpg


Pic #2 Now Complete (or main secrion upto half way round the pond). I manually raked up much of the non collected moss into a few piles then took the lazy option and mowed the lawn as I consider my Briggs and Straton mower just as much a hoover as a mower :D
DByknaY.jpg


Totally filled up my standard standard sized brown wheelie bin with what the scarifier brought up and that included having to jump into it a few times to compress it down :p
Click to expand...
 
Tony Edwards said:
You are going to need to rake the hell out of it and it will look bad for a while.

That brown stuff is rhyzomes if I remember right, which is how grass moves about. You need to rake the dead grass (thatch) that is under the green grass, moss and other plants that arent grass and then I would reseed and spread fine compost over the top and water often. Either around now or at the begining of spring but it will be a lot of work to get it good and then maintenance to stop it getting like that again.

Great thread by Chpperhead about making a new lawn but sadly the photos have gone. Im sure he had one about renovation/maintenance aswell before that thread but I can find it in my bookmarks.

https://forums.overclockers.co.uk/threads/chipperheads-guide-to-creating-a-new-lawn.18503387/

Here we go the renovation one

https://forums.overclockers.co.uk/threads/chipperheads-guide-to-lawn-renovation.18012554/
Click to expand...


Thanks for the advice Tony - I really want to get on top of it before it gets worse as I totally destroyed the lawn at the last house I lived in with letting the moss take over the whole lawn....

Would it be best to:-

Dethatching / iron sulphate now to remove the moss in September and then apply grass seeds
Wait until spring to do everything?
Do some things September and then other things Spring (if so what)

I think if I dethatch now it will leave really large bare spots and leave the grass even more threadbare until I overseed it..

I have a large lawn and some areas the moss has taken over the grass and I dont want it to spread to the healthier parts.

Any recommendations for a lawn scarifier for a large lawn (aprox 500m2)?
 
spluff said:
Thanks for the advice Tony - I really want to get on top of it before it gets worse as I totally destroyed the lawn at the last house I lived in with letting the moss take over the whole lawn....

Would it be best to:-

Dethatching / iron sulphate now to remove the moss in September and then apply grass seeds
Wait until spring to do everything?
Do some things September and then other things Spring (if so what)

I think if I dethatch now it will leave really large bare spots and leave the grass even more threadbare until I overseed it..

I have a large lawn and some areas the moss has taken over the grass and I dont want it to spread to the healthier parts.

Any recommendations for a lawn scarifier for a large lawn (aprox 500m2)?
Click to expand...
I didnt bother with iron sulphate I just raked the hell out of it as i couldnt be bothred to wait for it to work. Anything not good grass with rake away leaving lots of sorry looking patches of grass. Apart from certain weeds or other plants you might need to dig out (I just had another look at your photo and that is a lot of clover.). Grass seeds need about 6 to 8 weeks to germinate establish for first cut. To be honest I do a lot of this stuff in patches in most seasons if it needs to be done apart from winter. But id prefer late summer/autumn or spring for sowing. Grass stops growing at low temperature to an extent.

There is no way around it, it may look badish for 6 to 8 weeks after you spread the seeds and that or new turf is the only way to fix it. Although if your grass patches are healthy they will start to spread in that time as well. But once those seeds sprout and you bend down and look across the horizon of the new grass you will be filled with the sense of accomplishment.

You could do it in areas. Do a couple now and leave the rest for spring. Personaly I would rake it and sort the soil first and then if you have time reseed and if not reseed springish or leave the whole thing until spring. You need to start at some time.

I would rake, mow and rake again a patch now about the size of the whole photo of the rhizomes one and see what you are dealing with, then spread some compost and seed.

Cant help you with an electric scarifier as I quite enjoy the manual labour at times.
 
Gaijin said:
I feel your pain, I have about 1000sqm of lawn generally in worse conditions than yours!

Sulphate of Iron and a rake/scarifier for the moss. It will be bare so be prepared to sow/water/protect.

You can used a broad lawn weedkiller for the clover. I use Dicophar for mine but Weedol or similar will work.



September is a really good time to do pretty much anything lawn related:

4CsZPet.jpg
Click to expand...
This. Mine is a much smaller garden, thanks God for that, considering the work required.
Few blisters after raking the dried moss after killing it using the mentioned chemicals.
Too bad one corner of the garden still suffers during winter due to the lack of sunshine.
 
that chart looks good - might laminate a copy and stick it to shed door (inside). Grass we got with house 3yrs ago was fairly new in back but already had weeds and moss taking over. front patch of grass was more weeds than grass. Slowly been treating it and raking it though seems to be more of an uphil struggle than anything else.

had a few dogs we look after that love to dig - not helpful! need to get some topsoil down to even out the land as have a few dents and dips, should make mowing next year a little easier.
 
[QUOTE="Tony Edwards, post: 33016680, member: 201585" (I just had another look at your photo and that is a lot of clover.). Grass seeds need about 6 to 8 weeks to germinate establish for first cut. To be honest I do a lot of this stuff in patches in most seasons if it needs to be done apart from winter. But id prefer late summer/autumn or spring for sowing. Grass stops growing at low temperature to an extent.
[/QUOTE]

Yeah lawn has big patches of clover which covers areas and also other weeds.... I think its too late to start worrying about weeds and maybe that would be best to do next spring?

Also if I overseed the lawn - I need to wait 6 to 8 weeks - the other grass will have grown quite a bit in that time - what do you do about this? If I cant cut the grass in 2 months
 
Rhizomes are under the ground not on top. They are kind of like tubers, so they grow across then grass breaks up into the surface.

I wouldn't worry about that so much as the clover and moss. That grass you can at least compete with by raking it up and then cutting it as I mentioned our gardener at work does this. The moss mainly is the issue, smothering the light getting to the grass and slowly beating it.
There is no point over seeding until you get the moss under control, most of teh seed wont make it to the ground to grow. As you start to get the moss out the grass that is there will start to spread anyway.
 
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