Watch out for pink snow mold in your yard
Wasn’t it awesome to walk outside this past week and see the sun and feel a temperature above freezing? I had been inside most of the morning on Tuesday and when I walked out to go to a meeting, I was overwhelmed with excitement for spring.
Don’t get me wrong, I realize that there is still more winter to come. And that’s OK; it’s just nice knowing that the snow is melting and spring is near.
Melting snow may reveal some issues in the landscape, pink snow mold in the lawn being one of them. This disease is encouraged in areas where there has been prolonged snow cover as well as cool to moderate temperatures.
We have certainly had the snow cover. I don’t remember the last time we had snow cover for this long. Well, yes, I do in fact, it was in 2010 because I have lots of pictures of resulting damage from the snow cover.
Pink snow mold or Michrodochium nivale, is also called michrodochium patch due to the patch like appearance of the infected turf. Small patchy areas of grass appears matted and the blades are a yellowish or straw color. The patches can be as small as an inch in diameter and as large as a foot.
When these patches are wet, grass may show a light, pinkish-colored growth, especially around the blades on the outer edge of the patch. If the weather stays damp, these patches may continue to develop.
I have never seen pink snow mold kill a lawn. Typically, when the weather dries up and temperatures rise, the disease goes away.
If you have these patches, raking the grass lightly will encourage new shoot and leaf development when weather warms up.
If you have an excessive layer of thatch (more than one-half inch of the soft, spongy organic layer between the grass blade and the soil) you may want to dethatch this spring.
You may also want to fertilize this spring to encourage new growth as well as improve drainage in areas that might hold moisture.
Other damage that I am seeing has to do with my rabbit saga that I shared the last few weeks. I followed the tracks and found a few chewed shrubs.
For the most part, the shrubs don’t bother me because I tend to prune many of them back in the spring. Deciduous shrubs come back from this type of pruning.
However, the Blue Atlas cedar that I planted last summer took me to the end of my patience. The rabbits chewed off two of the lower branches, up to about as high as they could reach on top of the snow.
I followed the track to the vegetable garden and found a nest established in the snow. I must take action but it’s so hard. Fencing is the way I will go.