I received many inquires about brown patches on established lawn, especially in summer. We all know summer can be extremely hot and dry in Brisbane, and sometimes it lasts for a few days to a couple of weeks. Even though brown patches can be caused by many reasons, and in most time you are probably advised by a landscaper that your turf is attacked by fungus or beetles. However, before you consider taking any treatment to your lawn, I would suggest you dig out a small patch and see what is underneath. If it is healthy, no visible white worms or strange colours, your lawn may just need a good drink.
The same happened on my lawn this summer, we put down 240 m2 of Empire Zoysia two months ago, we watered them for 2 weeks day and night, and they looked great. Then we thought they should have established themselves and we stopped watering them. Then summer came, about two weeks ago after a hot week, we noticed some areas are drying out and some brown patches appeared. We scratched our head, couldn’t figure out what happened. We then dig out a small patch and found nothing underneath. The soil looked dark and healthy, and the root system is very thick (almost 100 mm). Then we bought three good sprinklers (I will talk about this champion sprinklers later) and water them day and night for 30 min each. And they recovered very quickly; the brown patches are getting smaller and smaller in a few days. We are still watering them and I think it is very important to keep an eye on the weather, if it is going to be very hot, no matter how well your lawn have established themselves, please make sure you give them a good drink every day until the the weather cools down.