Lawn help please - stuck on what to do

Sometimes you can save things, and sometimes you have to bite the bullet.

I regularly tell my boss at work, invest one day now and you'll get at least 10 days back later.

It applies to many things, including the garden. You could stick with what you've got, and spend cumulatively many months trying to restore the lawn. Or you could sacrifice the lawn completely and have no lawn at all for a few weeks, but by next spring have a nice lawn that is low maintenance, requiring little more than a weekly haircut.

Looking at your latest picture though, to me it looks salvageable, but it will require some brutal attention.

I think I'd do the following:
1. Mow it close.
2. Aerate, just stick the fork in at regular intervals.
3. In the middle bit, where the grass is really struggling, just be brutal with the rake.
4. Give it a good covering with sharp sand. Just chuck it by the handful over the grass. Don't do it all in one go, because you want the grass to grow back through the sand, and the sand to work in. Do it every few days over the course of the next couple of weeks. For a lawn of that size, about 5x25kg bags will be plenty. The middle area would benefit from some compost mixed with the sand.
5. Scatter new seed over the whole area, especially the middle section. Choose a lawn seed that promises a hardwearing lawn that features perennial rye grass. It will blend in well with what you've already got.

By late spring next year, it will be lush.

 

Liked thought

I really like your views and how nicely you have linked this with gardening. This rule applies everywhere!

 

Whilst on this subject does the same apply when there are lots of moss
Thanks Jean

 

Moss thrives in damp conditions, especially if there is shade.

The trick my very wise, elderly former next door neighbour told me (which I tried and it worked) is to make the lawn inhospitable to moss.

The first phase is the brutal raking, to scrape out as much moss as possible. Then comes the sharp sand, and rake again. Lots more moss will come out, plus the crust layer ("pan") will be broken by the rake allowing better drainage.

The sand helps keep the surface free draining, and improves air circulation at the surface of the lawn. The grass is much deeper rooted than moss, so can find moisture in the soil, but the moss, which doesn't really have much in the way of roots sits on the surface, ie the sand, and so can't find moisture, and so it can't thrive.

Keeping the lawn mowed short also helps keep the surface dry and keeps shade at bay, again making it unfavourable for moss.

Of course you can scatter a moss killer, which will kill some of the moss that's there, but if conditions are still favourable for moss it just comes straight back.

 

Thanks clueless I will try that ,it makes sense.
The problem is we are continually fighting moss on lawns paths everywhere because I am in the West of Scotland which is very wet/damp even some times in summer, although this year the summer has been dryer .
My lawn is on a slope and I would have expected excess water to drain away but I think the damp is in the air a lot of the time.