Fairy Rings

Have any of you ever heard of Fairy Rings? Well, if you haven't - like myself - once you have your own lawn to care for, you'll learn quickly! Once the grass in the yard started turning green, I noticed that there are a few distinct areas that were not growing in at all - I mean, there wasn't even grass to grow. Since the grass has been growing longer, I've noticed that the patches of no/dead grass are circular. I thought maybe the owners before us had a kiddie pool, or something on the lawn that could have killed off the grass? But... there is still grass growing in the middle of the circle... thats peculiar.

Then I remembered a neighbor telling us to make sure we bleach the bottom of our lawnmower so that we don't pass on any fungus or diseases from the last lawn it cut. He also mentioned that he has been battling Fairy Ring at his last 2 properties now... Well, what is this fairy ring? Mikey told me that he remembers a Fairy Ring in their yard when he was younger, and that a bunch of mushrooms popped up in a circle in the lawn... Crap, we have a few Fairy Rings.

I did some research online, and found out that there are a few different kinds of Fairy Rings, and depending on what kind you have, you can see symptoms of mushrooms, dead/withered grass, or dark green, lush grass, and they can form in arcs, or complete circles. Hidden in the soil is a complete network of threadlike fungus as it grows deep into the ground to find food. The fungus can deplete the soil of valuable nutrients causing the grass to whither, or produce hormones causing rapid luxurious grass growth.

There is also quite a bit of folklore surrounding the origin of Fairy Rings, which has a multitude of stories, and depending where you hear it from, can include elf's, fairies, witches, and even the devil. But I wont get into that right now, what I am most concerned about is.... what am I going to do about it? After some more research, it looks pretty hopeless. If I wanted to try and remove it entirely from our lawn, that would include digging up and removing all the "infected" soil - which could be more than a few feet deep - replacing the soil, and grass, and hoping it doesn't come back, but its not garunteed.

You could try fungicides, and nasty chemicals, but with no guarantee, is it worth it? I know for a fact that I have at least 3 Fairy Rings in my lawn (because I checked the soil and it has the white threads of fungus in it) and I am not about to dig it up, or pour chemicals on my lawn. But I did find something to help mask the problem, it's called the "poke and soak" method:

"Poke and Soak"

Using a soil probe or similiar tool, poke holes into the fairy ring, approx 2 inches apart until you have opened up a great many areas within the fairy ring. Once this is achieved, soak the ring with soapy water (dish soap is fine) . The soapy water acts as a wetting agent and makes the water "wetter" helping the moisture get deeper into the mycelium layer to get to the turf grass roots. If you can get enough moisture to the root structure of the grass it will continue to live and not die out creating a dead area. This method must be done on a rigid schedule in order to succeed, once a day for 4 to 6 weeks so as you can see it is somewhat labour intensive. Interestingly enough most of the so called "cures" you find at farmers markets and such will sell you a product that uses this method to incorporate their product into the affected area. You can do the same thing without shelling out your hard earned money.

Beacuse I dont have any grass at all around the circle, we did the poke and soak, minus the dish soap, and then sprinkled grass seed on top. Once that seed starts to sprout, we may continue with the soap. I'll have to make sure that its OK on new grass tho. Now, we just have to wait and see if it helps at all, wish me luck!

Here are two photos I took this morning of the 2 noticeable Fairy Rings (the other one is only a small arch):