Is your grass dead, or just sulking?
By Clyde Macababbad, founder of Mowie · · 6 min read · read 32 times
Checked against 3 sources on
Every July someone in Melbourne's north looks out at a brown lawn and starts pricing turf. Hold on. Most brown lawns here are warm-season grasses doing what they're built to do - shut down for winter, come roaring back in October. Before you spend anything, spend ten seconds on the tug test.
The tug test
Grab a handful of brown grass and pull, firmly. If it resists and the base of the stems shows any green or cream-white, it's alive - dormant, not dead. If it comes away in your hand with no resistance, roots and all, that patch really is dead and no amount of water is bringing it back. Test a few spots; lawns rarely die evenly.
Reading the pattern
- The whole lawn is evenly brown - almost certainly dormancy or drought stress. Couch and kikuyu, which is most of what grows in Melbourne's north whether anyone planted it or not, go straw-coloured after frost and in deep summer drought. They're waiting it out. More in the winter lawn guide.
- Defined circles or irregular dead patches - now it's worth investigating. The usual suspects, in rough order of likelihood:
| What you see | Likely culprit | The check |
|---|---|---|
| Patches that lift like a doormat, birds tearing at the lawn | Curl grubs (beetle larvae eating the roots) | Lift a patch edge - fat white C-shaped grubs in the top 5 cm of soil |
| Round dead spots with a dark green ring, mainly where a dog hangs out | Dog urine - it's basically fertiliser overdose | The green halo gives it away |
| Stripes or patches appearing days after feeding | Fertiliser burn | Matches where you spread (or spilled) it |
| Thin, hard, bald areas along paths and play areas | Compaction - roots can't breathe | A screwdriver won't push into the soil |
| Thinning under trees, moss creeping in | Shade - grass needs 3-4 hours of direct sun | Sunnier parts of the lawn are fine |
Fixing the patches that really are dead
Deal with the cause first - grub treatment, a designated dog corner, easing off the fertiliser, aerating the compaction - or the new grass dies the same way the old grass did. Then repair in season: warm-season grasses (couch, kikuyu, buffalo) re-establish from runners or turf between October and Christmas; cool-season fescue seeds best in early autumn. Patching in the wrong season mostly feeds sparrows. The patchy lawn guide walks through the repair itself.
And if it's dormant?
Do very little. Keep mowing, higher and less often, so weeds don't take the free real estate. Water deeply once a fortnight in a dry winter. Don't fertilise a dormant lawn - it can't use the feed, but the winter weeds absolutely can. Spring will do the rest, no invoice attached.
Quick answers
How do I tell if my lawn is dead or dormant?
Grab a handful of brown grass and pull firmly. If it resists and the base of the stems shows green or cream-white, it is dormant and alive. If it comes away roots and all with no resistance, that patch is dead.
Why is my whole lawn brown in winter?
Couch and kikuyu, which is most of what grows in Melbourne's north, are warm-season grasses. They go straw-coloured after frost and in deep summer drought and come back in October. Mow high and less often, and do not fertilise.
What kills a lawn in patches?
Curl grubs (patches lift like a doormat), dog urine (dead circles with a dark green ring), fertiliser burn, compaction along paths, and shade under trees. Fix the cause first, then repair in season.
Find your suburb, what a cut costs there and which mowers cover it.
Where this comes from
Each source below backs a specific claim on this page. Last read on . We take no payment from anyone linked here.
- 1. Lawn Solutions Australia: the ultimate guide to grass - buffalo, couch and kikuyu compared, including hours of sun each needs
- 2. Lawn Solutions Australia: how to identify lawn grubs - bird activity, turf that lifts away, and the soapy-water test
- 3. Lawn Solutions Australia: identifying and treating winter grass (Poa annua) - winter grass seeds heavily; a pre-emergent before it germinates is the fix
Clyde started Mowie in Mill Park in 2026 and runs it day to day. The prices and timings in these guides come from the jobs booked through the site and from the mowers who do them, and everything else is checked against the source listed beside it. He lives on a kikuyu lawn in Melbourne's north that has taught him most of this the hard way.
More about Mowie and Clyde · Tell us if something here is wrong