If you own a dog or two, you know that beautiful spring lawn can be marred by a few big brown circles.

We don't get much rain in San Diego, so we irrigate. Our irrigation water is high in salt. Dog urine is also high in salt. All that salt congregates in the root zone and kills the grass where the dogs pee.

The solution to the problem is removing the salts. To do it, I spread gypsum on the entire lawn twice a year. It allows the water to move more quickly through the soil and leach out the salts. Water heavily after the gypsum is applied to remove concentrated salts.

If your lawn is Bermuda grass, Kikuyu grass or St Augistine grass, then the gypsum should be enough; the brown spots will heal themselves. However, if your lawn is fescue, rye or blue grass, you’ll need to replace the dead spots. First remove the dead grass, add some compost to the bare spot and spread the appropriate seed over the area, or cut a piece of sod and patch it back in the hole. It will blend in within a couple weeks.

Good luck, thanks for watching and enjoy the garden. Loren