Spotted, yellow grass is an eye-sore. We all just want clean and green grass, right? You’ve tried fertilizer, over-seeding, aeration, and more regular watering but nothing works! What to do? To get pale yellow grass green again, the culprit may be your best friend, your own dog! Don’t worry, dogs and healthy, green grass can get along together!
You just need to take some simple steps to restore new life to your lawn. Dog urine contains heavy amounts of nitrogen and salt. Deposited in a regular spot over time builds up the nitrogen to levels too high for typical grass lawns, resulting in yellowing and in advanced cases death. Have you heard only female dogs cause the problem?
It’s said they tend to squat versus leg-lift markers to relieve themselves, but any dog may do this. Others blame alkalinity of the urine for the yellowing grass, but this is also false. Dog urine’s high concentration of nitrogen and salt in the cause, which one can observe with a dark green “halo” around yellow spots. As urine is absorbed to the soil, its concentration lessens the farther it travels.
Small added nitrogen will actually improve the appearance of grass, resulting in the lush darker green around a dead, yellow center. Dog poop on the other hand is even more harmful. It not only adds too much nitrogen and acid to the lawn, it potentially provides an incubator to parasites and bacteria. Regular pet waste removal is a must.