moss in lawn

[NotAnEMERGENCY]

I recently signed up for Green Thumb and they carried out the first lawn treatment a couple of weeks ago. There is quite a lot of moss (as well as other weeds). They said the treatment would kill off the moss and other weeds, and that I should give the lawn a rake through at some point after the treatment.

I had a go with the rake yesterday but I'm not sure how hard to rake. If I rake really hard, a LOT of moss comes up and this would leave scary-looking big patches. Am I just supposed to rake a little bit? Just enough to thin out the moss so the grass has a chance to regain control slowly? And then next time, rake a bit more again so the grass can gradually spread?

I was told re-seeding grass would not be necessary as once the moss and weeds were gone, the grass would be able to recover and fill up any gaps. But I'm not sure if the grass could cope with massive bare patches.

Any advice?

[dodobookends]

Perhaps contact them, explain the situation and ask for their instructions?

[Qwebec]

If the patches are big, I guess it would grow back eventually, but it would be faster to trow in some seeds. Also, moss does not do well with competition so it tends to grow where nothing else will. Try to find out what is wong and guet the appropriate type of grass.

[NotAnEMERGENCY]

Thanks for the comments!

I phoned Green Thumb this morning and they said it probably would be best to reseed. I suspect they were fibbing when they originally said it wouldn't be necessary. (They are quite keen on the hard sell.)

I think it'd probably be best to use seed for shady lawns. Assuming the grass that is already there is just normal grass, will it be obvious that some patches are different once the newly seeded grass has grown? Or are the differences too subtle?

I know you can reseed in autumn and spring but there seems to be a consensus that there are more benefits to seeding in autumn. Is it too late now though? It's supposed to go down to 4 degrees tonight so if that's what the weather is going to be like from now on, I'd have thought it's too risky. So I presume I should wait with seeding till spring and then reseed next autumn in places if necessary.

Any thoughts?

[ninenicknames]

Well, I did the whole chucked a load of 4 in 1 seed all over the lawn.

Killed off weeds & moss, left grass.

Takes it & removed all dead shit.

Threw a load of hard wearing homebase on grass seed on it 3 weeks and WOW! Lush green grass .... I kid you not.

It's cheap & easy to do.

I wasn't expecting this mind you. Thought I'd ruined the grass for good!