One of the worst things that can happen to a lawn is a grub infestation. This can not only be difficult to diagnose, but it can leave your lawn a brown and burnt patch of ugliness. To keep your lawn green and healthy, you will want to not only prevent the problem from happening, but stop it from getting worse as soon as possible. There is no such thing as a grub-proof lawn. The only way that this is possible is to live on one of the arctic caps. If your lawn is a frozen mass of ice all year, grubs are the least of your worries. For the rest of the planet, you are susceptible to grubs. If you are not sure if grubs can be a problem for you, look around your local area. If you see even one beetle, you can get grubs in your lawn.
In order to diagnose a grub problem, you need to know what a grub is. Grubs are the larvae of beetles. This is why, if you have beetles in the area, you are prone to grubs. A grub is a small worm like creature that is usually white in color and about an inch to three inches in length. They can be anywhere from a maggot in appearance, to a worm or caterpillar looking thing the size of your thumb. The type of grub you have will depend on the types of beetles in your neighborhood. These little guys usually show up around the end of summer through the fall. August to October are the most common months to see a grub problem, but any time after the beetles lay their eggs can cause damage. One good idea is to be familiar with the local insect life. This will help you be more familiar with the types of grubs to look for how to prevent or destroy them.
Now that you know the enemy, you can start to look for the problems that they cause. The way that grubs damage your lawn, is that they feast on the roots of the grass. Your lawn can handle some of these pests, but when there gets to be too many, they can cause brown spots. The problem is that when there is any problem with your lawn, it can cause brown spots. To be sure that you are dealing with grubs, you will need to get a count. In the center of the brown spot, you can use a post hole digger, or round shovel if you have one, to get a sample of the top two inches of soil. If you use a round shovel of post hole digger, it is easy to replace the hole. You can also use a small spade. Once you have this sample, you can sift through the soil and look for the grubs. When they are eating your grass, they will commonly be in a C shape. If you can count more than eight of these little creatures per square foot of yard, you will need to take care of the problem. If you are starting to see brown spots and you know you have grubs, it may be a good idea to get rid of them no matter how dense of a population you have.
There are two different ways to rid your lawn of grubs. The first is to use a grub killer. These are usually chemical and you will want to make sure that it includes imidacloprid or halofenozide. These two are the best chemical compounds to kill most all grubs. You can usually find these in grub killers at any hardware store. The second way is more organic. Milky spore is very useful against grubs since this bacteria is actually poisonous to the worms. If you lay down milky spore in the dirt prior to planting your grass, or spread it all over your lawn just prior to watering, you can get this bacteria into the soil. Once you lay it down several times, your lawn will be infected with this bacteria for at least ten years. Another organic solution is to use nematodes. These are a little harder to find, but they are actually very small worms that eat the grubs as eggs or shortly after they hatch. This will prevent the problem before it happens. To get rid of an existing problem though, nematodes may not work.
While grubs can be very damaging, they can also be very easy to get rid of. There are several different products on the market that are geared toward the extermination of this problem. A quick trip to the hardware store can yield several different options. If you use pest control measures from the early spring, you will not likely have a problem with grubs. Keeping the beetles from going into your lawn is the best way to keep grubs out.
