What is Snow Mold and is it Serious?

If you’ve lived in Buffalo long enough, you will have this issue with your grass from time to time in the springtime:  pieces of discolored grass, either matted or straw-colored with a pinkish or white web-like coating that emerges in the early part of spring. It comes up as the snow starts to melt and may continue to spread and grow as long as the weather is damp and cold.

Typically, the discolored blotches start to minimize as the weather get dry and hot. But in some years when the weather is wet and cold, the blotches may stay all summer and fall. The spots are known as snow mold.

What is snow mold? It is a lawn disease brought on by two main fungal culprits: pink snow mold and gray snow mold. As the names suggest, gray snow mold displays a white-to-grayish webbing, and pink snow mold has a pink to grayish hue. We at Buffalo Tree Service have seen our share of grass infected with a fungus.

Damage to Lawns
You probably won’t get snow mold each year, but if you look closely, you will see that it's most profound in the spring after a winter when the snow came early and was heavy enough to cover the earth that wasn’t completely frozen.

When more snow starts to fall, the warm ground under the snow was carrying fungal growth and you are confronted with the results when the thaw arrives in the spring. A frigid winter without much snow is less likely to develop snow mold damage in the spring.

Though the fungal spots you see in the spring are unattractive, they aren’t that serious. As the weather gets warm and your grass dries out, the infected places will slowly green up.

Prevention and Organic Treatments

• Rake the spoiled spots lightly to aerate the grass blades and aid them in drying out.
  
• Take up any thatch layer that is over 1/2 inch thick. You shouldn’t do this until your lawn is somewhat dry and has been mowed a couple of times.
• Mow the lawn to a short length until the mold isn’t growing anymore. Tall grass holds more moisture, which encourages fungal growth.
  
• Rake up leaves in the autumn. This also helps in lessening the trapped moisture. If you want to know if you have a snow mold issue and what your options are, contact a Buffalo arborist.​