A little word of warning at a time when you are thinking of gowing on your summer holidays.
Whilst you may be entering into a relaxed mode the Chafer Grub could be working his little socks off under your lawn and devouring all of the succulent grass roots.
Look for areas that have stunted, discoloured or distorted growth. There may be no pattern to any attack and it is possible to have several metres of damaged lawn at either end of the lawn with areas that have no damage at all.
If you notice a patch, use a spade to dig out a small square right on the extreme of the damaged area as the grubs tend to radiate away from where they start.
The shadiest and dampest parts of the lawn are favoured because the grubs can move more freely and the grass roots are much more succulent.
The Chafer grub is not quite so destructive as Leatherjackets but because they can live in the lawn for up to four years they will eat through an awful lot of your grass roots and of course, it does not matter how hard you work with your remedial lawn maintenance, fertilising and scarifying and killing the weeds, if the roots are being eaten away, your hard work can be in vain.
Consider using Nematodes as a natural way to deal with the problem. English Heritage turned to Nematodes when Chafer grubs caused extensive damage to the grass around Stonehenge. It eliminated the use of chemicals and allowed treatment to be carried out without restricting public access to the world famous site.
The control of Chafer grubs also reduces the risk or damage to your lawn from scavengers such as Badgers, Woodpeckers or other carrion.
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