During spring and summer, the temperatures here in Florida continue to rise and without rainfall, we begin to see a condition called heat tracking. Heat tracking occurs when pressure is applied to the lawn from foot traffic, lawnmowers, fertilizer spreaders, or anything else that can compress the leaf blade down to the ground below. The leaf blade is no longer able to stay green, and it turns brown. The good news is the grass blade is just damaged, and the grass is not dead. The turf should recover in about two weeks. Although this damage appears as herbicide or fertilizer burn from tire marks, it is simply caused by natural processes.
Our team is taking precautions to prevent heat tracking by assessing the lawns before services are performed. We will notify management if an area or specific homes need to be skipped for that week to prevent heat tracking.
We recommend homeowners to minimize foot traffic, parking, or driving on the grass during this time of year to prevent heat tracking. The attached PDF shows examples of heat tracking so the homeowners can know what it looks like and that it is a natural process during this time of year. However, if homeowners are uncertain what they are seeing is heat tracking they are welcome to submit a ticket in our system with a photo attached and our representatives will be able to advise.
Once constant rainfall returns this drought stress condition will disappear completely. We will continue to monitor the properties and work with management closely.
We are currently in the dry season and will start experiencing more drought conditions as the temperatures continue to rise. This will continue until daily rain showers resume, historically the middle of June. Dry spots/drought stress on the lawns will be normal this time of the year.
More water/time is not always the answer or an option. In fact, water restrictions may become a factor that would limit the amount of water/runtime that we are allowed to run. The further we go into the dry season we may need to restrict the entire community to manage the water source. Even if mandated water restrictions are not implemented, we may have to reduce water to ensure we have irrigation for the entire community as the lake levels will go down not allowing us to run the pumps
The "hot spots" that you see are typical this time of year. Our irrigation team is performing monthly wet checks and has even increased to weekly visual inspections to address problem areas.
Currently, we are receiving an abundance of irrigation tickets in our system but everything is functioning properly with each homeowner's system. Our recommendation is to inform the homeowners of this seasonal change and to have patience with their ticket submissions. Our irrigation team is working hard to address each ticket concern in a timely manner and stay on schedule with the monthly wet checks. "Hot spots" will no longer be an issue once the turf and plant material adapt to the drier weather but if homeowners would like to see a difference faster we advise to hand-water the hot spots during this drought season, it is more effective when done during early morning or late evening.
Thank you for your patience during this hot season and please feel confident that we are in“all hands on deck” mode to get through this season.
The following information was forward to our representative by the department of agriculture . The university of Florida has identified this disease in our county . We will be making recommendations to minimize the spread of the disease and possible recommendations if any to treat the palms .
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