Chances are you never heard of rhizoctonia unless you’re a lawn care professional or work for a golf course. Yet, if you live in the Akron, Cleveland, and Columbus, Ohio regions, you do run the risk of having it in your yard. Rhizoctonia is also known as Brown Patch disease.

What is Brown Patch, And How Did My Lawn Get It?

Brown Patch disease is a fungus that kills grass blades at the base of the plants. It commonly occurs during heat waves where the weather is hot and humid. The cycle begins when the gray to brown fungi branch out from the soil or thatch and starts to infect grass blades.

When there’s too much fertilizer in the ground and periods of water sitting on the grass, Brown Patch tends to flourish.

After Brown Patch starts to destroy your lawn, you’ll notice that your turf will have circular patterns of dead grass. You might see a “bald spot” of sorts in the middle of this pattern with a few green grass blades sticking up.

How to Get Eliminate and Prevent Brown Patch

Promoted by high tempretures, humidity, and wet soil, Brown Patch is prevelant during the Summer months in Ohio. Here's a few tips on how to eliminate and prevent this common lawn disease:

You can avoid Brown Patch by:

• Limiting the use of fertilizers on your lawn during the middle and late summer when days and nights are muggy.
• Avoid mowing your lawn too short, as well as avoiding cutting your lawn too often to discourage fungi growth.
• Deeply watering your lawn once a week where you don’t just sprinkle water on your grass blades (which raises the risk of Brown Patch), but you irrigate your lawn where the water can soak into six inches of soil.
• All yard irrigation should be wrapped up by 7 p.m. so water doesn’t lay on your grass blades overnight causing the fungus to grow.

Eliminate Brown Patch by:

• Applying a fungicide specified to killing Brown Patch disease
• Consider aerating your lawn to “air out” your infected soil
• Consider de-thatching your lawn to prohibit rhizoctonia from forming again
• Reseed your lawn with grasses that tend to be resistant to the rhizoctonia strain
• Call a professional lawn care service provider to diagnose and treat your lawn of Brown Patch.

The dog days of summer are soon here. It’s best to employ the above practices to avoid Brown Patch damage to your turf. But realize that your Akron, Columbus or Cleveland lawn care professional, like Weed-Pro, can diagnose and treat your lawn that has Brown Patch. Call Weed-Pro at 1-866-724-4555 to schedule an appointment today.

Free Mobile App Helps Diagnose Brown Patch & Other Lawn Disease!

Weed Pro's mobile application can help you diagnose and fix problems all around your lawn. This free application is available in both the iTunes and Google Play store. Click the link below to receive the links to the application and a step-by-step users guide so that you can get the most out of your app!

About Wendy:
Wendy Komancheck is an accomplished Freelance Writer for Trade Magazines, Websites, and Local Businesses, specializing in horticultural articles. Check out Wendy's bio and website by Clicking Here. Wendy's Google+ Page