'How to get burnt grass green again' is a question that many gardeners will ask themselves at some time or another. Gardeners' World host and British garden designer Adam Frost has shared some simple tips for giving an unsightly brown patch of lawn a new lease of life.
As the warmer weather arrives, it doesn't take much to scorch an area of your garden - particularly if you enjoy using a fire pit or BBQ with friends and family. Luckily, you can gently get burnt grass looking luscious with a little bit of TLC.
Treating some burnt grass in his own garden on a recent episode of Gardeners' World, Adam Frost cuts into the good turf around the edge. Cutting into the healthy grass of the perimeter will make it easier to remove the surface layer of turf.
He then uses a fork to turn the soil over 'to break up any compaction.' Once he has broken up the soil, he adds a soil and compost mix to the damaged area. This introduces some much-needed goodness back into the soil to help the seeds to grow.
Next, he gently presses down on the area with his foot and rakes over it to create a seedbed.
'Once that's all prepped, the next thing is to sow the seed,' Adam says. He comments that a common mistake when sowing, particularly among those who have never done it before, is to sow too much seed.
'Look on the back of your packet and it'll tell you your sowing rates, if it doesn't say on top of the box, go to about 20g per square meter,' he advises.
He uses a standard lawn mix that has some ryegrass in it but says that if you have a shady patch of lawn, you could use a different seed to suit more shady conditions. Our piece on how to plant grass seed has lots of advice.
'Over the next few weeks, this really will need a good watering depending on the weather,' he adds.
If you don't have time to wait for seeds to grow, you can of course learn how to lay turf and go down that route. The preparation for laying turf, Adam says, would be the same as for sowing seeds.
If caring for your lawn is becoming a headache, there are plenty of alternatives to grass to choose from.
As a final step, he pins down some white fleece over the area to help with germination - and to stop people walking on it. This handy tip will also prevent local pigeons from getting to your grass seed. Fingers crossed your lawn will be vibrant green again in no time.
