Revive A Summer Lawn By Watering Its Roots

The recent long spell of dry weather has not done much for lawn growth in the UK. Roots have become starved of water, thus causing the turf to wither and die. I thought mine would be OK after all the treatment it had last autumn. Not so. As this recent photo - taken about three weeks ago - shows, it was looking decidedly patchy; yet it still felt soft under foot.

Always a handy tool, a garden fork soon revealed the problem: The patches of dying grass were bone dry underneath - so much so that it was sometimes difficult to get the fork into the ground because the soil had become hard. So there was nothing I could do except fork it all over and apply water into the holes. The fork test is a good guide. It should always be possible to push the tines into a lawn fairly easily; if you need to stand on it too much, water is needed - or soon will be.

TAKE IMMEDIATE ACTION

If you can see drought damage, it will already be well-advanced. So the sooner you take action, the better.

WETTING A DRY LAWN

Once a lawn dries out, it is virtually impossible to re-wet; the dry surface acts like a thatch roof, so water just runs off. We covered this last year when I showed how I get water into a dry lawn.

If all the above seems just a bit too strenuous and you don't mind running a sprinkler (or you're fortunate enough to have had some rain), you might be able to get away with just pricking the surface to get the water through the thatch.

I use a spiking tool if I can. But usually the surface has become too hard for the spikes to penetrate, so a sharp fork is useful.

WHAT YOU MUSTN'T DO

There is always a temptation to feed a dried-out lawn. DON'T - at least, not yet. Feeding a dry lawn is fatal, since it will invariably cause scorching. Always water first, then feed once it starts to recover.

WATERING ALMOST ALWAYS WORKS

In fact, I have found that WATERING WILL ALMOST ALWAYS REVIVE A LAWN, no matter how bad it looks. But the water must be applied to the roots not just to the surface. This is the stumbling block. Because it is easy to assume that if water is applied in abundance, it will find its way down. Take if from me - IT WON'T - it simply runs off.