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Lawn ruined by worm casts

djgrintdjgrint Posts: 34
in Problem solving
Hello,

Last Spring I laid a new lawn from turf (20x15 metres). I was delighted with it, it grew like crazy all summer and looked great. Then the Autumn came and huge worm casts started popping up everywhere repeatedly, casts on top of casts. The Autumn was particularly wet so they never dried out nor could I easily remove them. By the end of Autumn the casts covered about 30% of the lawn. The worms here are massive!

Now the grass is starting to grow again, but there are these big piles of mud left over from the worm casts. I pressume the grass under the casts will have died from no sun/air.

I guess I will seed the bare patches to fill in all the gaps, but I'm wondering if there's anyway to stop this happening every year?

Thanks for helping.

D

Posts

  • B3B3 Posts: 27,505
    Sweep them off when the weather is dry and collect  them for sowing seeds in
    In London. Keen but lazy.
  • djgrintdjgrint Posts: 34
    I can't, they're beyond sweeping off. They've been compacted down by little feet over the winter.
  • B3B3 Posts: 27,505
    I meant in the future😊
    In London. Keen but lazy.
  • ObelixxObelixx Posts: 30,090
    Worm casts mean you have worms and that's good because they are essential to soil health and will help your grass grow.   Get yourself one of those soft headed brushes like a witch's broomstick and use that with light flicks to spread the worm casts across the grass so they don't cut the light and make bare patches.

    https://www.rhs.org.uk/advice/profile?PID=806 for more info.
    Vendée - 20kms from Atlantic coast.
    "The price good men (and women) pay for indifference to public affairs is to be ruled by evil men (and women)."
    Plato
  • DovefromaboveDovefromabove Posts: 88,147
    edited February 2021
    Rake over the lawn firmly with a spring time lawn rake. It’ll break up the compacted casts and the grass will grow. If it needs a bit of seed leave it until mid April when the soil is warming up. Any earlier and you’re just feeding the birds. 

    Next autumn/winter use the lawn rake to disperse the casts before letting little feet loose out there ... are the owners of the little feet trainable/bribable?  Raking a lawn is easy and if you can convince them it’s also great fun you’re onto a winner 👍 

    This is the sort of thing ... the ones with metal tunes not plastic. https://www.primrose.co.uk/primrose-stainless-steel-spring-tine-lawn-rake-with-wooden-handle-p-61548.html?page=all

    If you get ones with woooden handles you can cut them down for use by smaller people 😉 

    Big fat worms underneath your lawn are a big advantage ... apart from anything else their tunnels improve drainage ... without them your lawn might well be boggy in the winter ... that’d be a disaster. 


    Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.





  • djgrintdjgrint Posts: 34
    Thanks for the advice. I did try dispersing the casts in the Autumn but they were so large, wet and sticky that I found I was ripping up the lawn trying to shift them.

    I'll try a good raking and see what happens over the spring.
  • KT53KT53 Posts: 9,016
    A tool called a Dew Switch will do the job, even with wet casts. 
  • Mike AllenMike Allen Posts: 208
    Worm casts on bowling greens, always a problem.  As KT53 says is the easiest and best method.
  • djgrintdjgrint Posts: 34
    Well I gave it a good raking over this lunchtime. You can see some of the worst affected patches below. Quite a lot of grass came up when raking. What do you think, will it come back?


  • JennyJJennyJ Posts: 10,576
    edited March 2021
    It doesn't look too bad considering we're just coming out of winter. I think it'll thicken up with regular trimming - little and often. Hand pull any weeds that you see coming up. And if you can keep the little feet off it when it's wet, so much the better, but it might be a big ask.
    Doncaster, South Yorkshire. Soil type: sandy, well-drained
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