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How to repair lawn?

Hi,

I am looking to repair my lawn, which you can see is in quite a state, and was wondering on which option you'd recomment:

1. From what I can tell, it's Kikuyu grass, do I stick with that and try to reseed and repain the dead patches and create a new patch next to the small decking?

2. Dig it all up, start fresh and lay with new pre-grown turf (like Sir Walter Buffalo)

Cheers,
Danny

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Repairing

Gardening

Planting and Growing

Lawn

Comments

JacobZ

Hi @DannyRowntree,

Thank you for your question and welcome to the Bunnings Workshop community, it is fantastic to have you with us.

I can't say for sure what species of grass you have but it looks like it could be kikuyu.

If you were to go with option 1, you would need to aerate and level the patches where no grass is growing as it appears they are low spots where water sits, killing any grass that is there.

I think option 2 is better as it will allow you to level the whole area and start fresh with guaranteed ground cover.

Allow me to tag @Dave-1, @Nailbag and @TedBear to see what they think.

Jacob

Dave-1

Good Evening @DannyRowntree

I havnt had a good run of regrown dead areas of grass, The patch I re-seeded has taken 2 years? ish to come back to being passable and still it is almost half weeds lol

Id be tempete dto go with dig out, level and prep the area as it does seem compacted a fair bit as @JacobZ noticed.

Before you do tho.... I can see an edge to a deck and a raised garden bed. If you want a green flat area then yeah id grass it. If you are trying to make an area nice again, maybe thinking about another garden bed? Bark mulch to cover the area? Break up that far concrete and extend grass or a garden area even?

Dave

Nailbag

Hi @DannyRowntree at this time of year this type of lawn will start to take off. But those dead spots appear to be low areas holding water/moisture and also look compacted. So, I would use a metal rake to deeply scratch up the surface in a criss-cross pattern then fill with a top-dressing. You can repurpose small cutouts of good lawn and reposition them in the dead areas to speed up the regrowth areas. Bottom line is agreeing with @JacobZ and keep what you have and work to restore it.

Nailbag

DannyRowntree

https://www.workshop.bunnings.com.au/discussion/comment/44456#Comment_44456

Hello,

Exactly a year ago I was on here asking about options to repair or replace a lawn. Thankyou @Nailbag @Dave-1 @JacobZ for your responses. I unded up digging it up, removing weeds and old grass, levelling (or I thought I did) and laying new Sir Walter Buffalo from Bunnings. Through summer and spring it really flourished and looked a amazing. It looked very healthy, had strong growth and required a few mows. However, winter hit and with the sun passing lower it started to die off (see pic below). During the depths of winter, two thirds of it doesn't get sun (where the grass is near the garden bed is pretty much the shadow line from the northern fence). I guess my questions are:

1. Do I just give up on grass in this area as no grass will withstand no sun in winter?

2. If grass can withstand, is it perhaps a drainage and water pooling issue...and if so, any recommendations on how i'd go about building in drainage or solutions to the pooling issue?

I really did enjoy the grass for six months, so that would be my preference, but there are also plenty of other solutions we could go with.

Thankyou.

EricL

https://www.workshop.bunnings.com.au/discussion/comment/92383#Comment_92383

Hello @DannyRowntree

I'm sorry to hear that your lawn did not survive the winter. However, if the lawn did not get any direct sunlight that pretty much spells the end for it. Buffalo lawn is very hardy, but even it needs a few hours of direct sunlight. I propose doing a hybrid approach such as a paved walkway with the lawn on the left and right of it. I've placed a sample image below rendered with AI to give you an idea what the walkway can look like in combination with the lawn.

Let me call on our experienced members @Dave-1, @Nailbag and @AlanM52 for their recommendations.

If you need further assistance, please let us know.

Eric

Dave-1

https://www.workshop.bunnings.com.au/discussion/comment/112272#Comment_112272

Good Evening @DannyRowntree

"Bugger" is what comes to mind. Having a look at your picture the weeds seem to be very happy with themselves while the center area is worn down.

Is it an high trafficed area?

Have you checked out teh PH of the soil?

And do you think the area stays super wet for a period of time?

I just zoomed in on the weeds on the right, I have those and I think they are cat claws 😕 They smother grass and kill it off, I have tried nuking it but it still comes back, I have pulled it out by the roots and it stays bare for a few months as grass slowly recolinises the area. That could be a reason for the grass die back?

If the area stays wet then that could also help explain why the grass has died off, or maybe a mixture of over damp and kids cricket pitch? 🙂

Maybe a next step would be to work on making the soil less dense? It still looks compacted even tho you have dug it up.

I do like @EricL's suugestion of the center path being more robust. That could work and still give you grass either side.

Dave

Nailbag

https://www.workshop.bunnings.com.au/discussion/comment/92383#Comment_92383

Hi @DannyRowntree

I can't go past that AI render of @EricL as the best and most aesthetically pleasing solution. Plus the practicality of not needing to mow and own a lawn mower for such a small area is to me a no-brainer.

Nailbag

AlanM52

Hi @DannyRowntree,

Kikuyu Grass.jpg

PlantNet identifies that as Kikuyu Grass.

I would do Option 2 with @EricL's AI Render and synthetic turf and you won't have anymore sunshine issues along with lawn care like mowing, trimming, watering etc. However... I encourage you to do some 'caring for synthetic turf' searching because it comes with it's own maintenance tasks.

Cheers

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