Horticulture News

DATE: December 31, 2007

HARDIN COUNTY COOPERATIVE EXTENSION SERVICE
201 Peterson Drive
Elizabethtown, Kentucky 42701-9370

BY: Amy Aldenderfer
County Extension Agent for Horticulture

Moss or Algae Growing in Your Lawn?

With the warm days lately, first plants that usually green up in spring have been popping up: moss. Don’t be alarmed if this happens in your yard; one should not always consider lawn moss as a weed, but as a valuable ground cover.

Mosses are very short, primitive-branched plants that often produce a dense, green felt-like mat over the soil surface. Moss does help stabilize the soil and cover an otherwise unprotected soil surface.

Ninety-nine percent of the time, the presence of moss or algae in the lawn is due to heavy shade and poor drainage. In general mossy areas are more common in lawns of Kentucky bluegrass than those of fescue or perennial ryegrass.

Moss does not directly compete with lawn grasses but generally begins to move in after a lawn begins to thin or decline. Traditionally a bluegrass lawn does not perform well in shady areas and will provide an excellent area for moss to become established.

Moss is also very common in shady areas where air circulation is poor but it will grow in full sun where the soil is very moist.

The following are several methods you can use to control moss or algae in your home lawn: Improve the soil drainage. Prune lower limbs from your shade trees (this does NOT mean to top the tree!!!); this will allow more sun to penetrate the tree canopy and will help with better air circulation. Maintain adequate soil fertility in the lawn areas, be careful not to over or under fertilize especially where there is heavy shade.

Educational programs of the Kentucky Cooperative Extension Service serve all people regardless of race, color, age, gender, religion, disability, or national origin.