Brown Patch

[Landscape Poet]

Originally Posted by Kevin16

I know I am 150 miles from the Fla-Ga border here in SC but one item you guys have forgotten and works awesome for me and that is to cut off the irrigation totally and that helps with the control of brown patch and you still have to spray it with fungicide but in my experience by either turning off or drastically reducing the irrigation helps in the control of brown patch. Yes you guys are right its a total ***** this time of year and goes all winter for me here.

Dialing back the irrigation should help, but sometimes mother nature has a different plan. Roughly the time this post was active a big portion of the state had 11 to 12 inches of rain hit during a Friday, Saturday, Sunday period just prior to a cold front. As a result lots of lawns got nailed.

[doug1980]

Got a call about this one on Friday. Looked like a strange color for Fall Patch, I was thinking it may be rust. This area was just laid a month ago.

[LawnoftheMonth]

Brown patch is severe in Houston, I tell my customers to reduce irrigation by 1/2 after Labor Day, that seems to be easy enough for them to understand. Heritage takes care of the rest.

[greendoctor]

Looking at the lesions on the leaves can often help diagnose. Also indicative is presence and appearance of mycelium in the early morning. Rust gives itself away by depositing orange spores on shoes and pants when walking through the grass. Heritage is a good fungicide for brown patch, leaf spot and rust. Make sure there is no dollar spot because it will not help that disease. Armada is a good choice too and probably safer because it is a combination of Compass(trifloxystrobin) and Bayleton(triadimefon). The Bayleton will prevent the dollar spot from jumping if it is present in the turf.

[olive123]

classic brown patch

[RAlmaroad]

Originally Posted by Ric

..

Heavy rains this year have given me fits with Gray Leaf spot. Normally I can fertilizer and out grow Gray Leave spot. But this year I had to treat with Fungicide earlier than normal. That Gray Leave Spot cure was also a preventive Brown patch treatment.

Brown patch used to be called Winter patch and is now called Large Patch. But let us call it Fall patch because that is when is cause problems. Rhizoctonia solani is the Microbial that causes Brown Patch. It is a soil Borne microbial and present year round. But in summer with Air temperature being 90 degrees the Grass temperature is 130 and too hot for Brown patch. As fall comes cooler temperature and short days, Brown Patch becomes active.

Keep records because you will have Brown patch in the same spot year after year. Knowing where these spots are allows you the Pretreat with a preventative.

Part of the reason for a 3 year apprenticeship before the Certification test is learning the life Cycles of Insects and disease first hand and learning to Prevent damage.


..

I start treatment for fungi in late May and continue every 28 days until end of October. Don't have too much of a problem. However this year, I saw some "Fall Patch". It wasn't too large but did confuse me. This was over the past weekend. It was in a spot that was know to have some ongoing fungus problems. Didn't need to mix up the big tank so I just mixed up a little Insignia and Daconic for just 1K and sprayed it after raking that spot and getting rid of the thatch. Talk about being set back to see a fungal problem in late November with temps down to 30s at night. Sorta ruined Thanksgiving--a first for me, but then again--all I deal with are First's.

[jvanvliet]

Temperatures down here in zone 9/10 continue into the mid 80's with frequent rains. Brown spot continues to be a problem as well as grubs. We prepped a site for sod last Teusday and pulled out grubs by the handful.

Temps are supposed to stay in the mid to upper 70's today and for a while, it'll be a welcome break.

[Landscape Poet]

Figured I would throw up a picture of the worst lawn I have with BP - this one started showing symptoms in early Sept. and I requested the L and O company come resolve while they were golf ball size patches. About 4 of them. They either did not then or were treating with a chemical that did not act as a curative and did not spray far enough around the area to create a good preventative program either.
By Mid October the lawn was engulfed with BP - after many attempts to have the L and O company resolve.
Needless to say this account I will have switching L and O companies in the Spring (The Owner Prepaid for the whole year). Pro-Mo from here on LS will most likely be gaining this account in the April Time Frame - assuming the owner is not sueing the existing L and O if the turf does not come back in nice full and lush by the spring time frame.
Please note that this photos were in the late Octoberish or early November Timeframe. It has gotten worse in it's spread since then but appears to be no longer active from what I can gather upon my last visit.

[jvanvliet]

I'm not sure if there is a 100% curative for brown patch, I believe it's mostly prophylactic in that it will control the fungus & keep the patch from spreading or forming new allowing the turf to recover. You can look for it in the same places every year if the conditions for it are right. The best preventative is probably cultural management as opposed to chemical.

Here's some intersting reading re. fungus &disease in St. Augustine. I'm sure many already know this stuff but for those who don't...

http://agfacts.tamu.edu/D11/Victoria...P/nbrwnpch.htm

[Landscape Poet]

Originally Posted by jvanvliet

I'm not sure if there is a 100% curative for brown patch.

http://agfacts.tamu.edu/D11/Victoria...P/nbrwnpch.htm

Kphyte and Armada are two that I know list a curative rate on the label. Now I do understand that is not going to fix it forever and the soil will still contain the disease but I can report that I went behind my spray company recently on my lawn as they were struggling to keep it from being active on my lawn. I sprayed a combination of Armada and Kphyte and no longer have what I understand to be active symptoms of it on the blades of the turf like I did previously.