Sarah, Author at Lawn Solutions Australia

Do you have ants in your lawn?

Posted on March 31, 2021March 20, 2025 by Sarah

Why Ants Play an Important Role in your lawn

Ants and other insects play an important part in our lawns and our gardens ecosystem. In small numbers they can assist in creating a healthy soil by aerating the ground through underground tunnels. However, when large infestations of these critters start to appear, they can cause both cosmetic and root damage to your lawn.

Why are there ants in my lawn?

Ants help create a balanced ecosystem in our gardens as they help break down plants and help get rid of dead insects.

Ants will feed on the dead bugs, beetles, leaves and other organic material that can be left sitting in our gardens. This will then be brought down into the ant nest which is commonly located underneath the soil. As this material decomposes it can act as a natural fertiliser for your soil.

What ants make up an ant colony?

All ants within a colony play an important role in bringing in food, protecting the nest and ensuing the colony is populated enough to last into the future.

In every colony there is a queen ant. She is responsible for laying all eggs for the colony, so that they will continue to survive and thrive into the future. The queen is located deep within the ant colony so that she is protected from any predators who try to get into the nest.

Male ants, also known as Drone ants, only have one job. This is to mate with the queen ant to ensure that the nest will continue to grow.

Female ants in the colony are responsible for building and maintaining underground tunnels and the nest itself. Other female ants will go beyond the nest to look for food, while others will protect the colony from other ant colonies.

Why are we sometimes anti-ants?

Ants are territorial insects who will protect their nest. When ants become territorial, they can often bite and sting the person or thing they become threatened by. This can often lead to painful bites.

Ant’s nests produce mounds above the ground, which can be of annoyance to some when mowing as they can cause damage to your mower blades. These nests also create an unpleasant appearance when you are trying to relax and enjoy your lawn.

How to spot an ant infestation

You can identify an ant infestation by looking at 2 factors:

A significant number of ant mounds
Dead and dry patches in the lawn with small holes usually nearby

Mounds are made up of dirt and sand. The ants will dig and build underground tunnels and nests within the soil. The material that is dug out by the ants is then left on top of the ground as mounds. These can appear in various spots across your lawn.

Dry patches caused by ants will only occur when there is an infestation present. These patches will occur when ants tunnel through the lawn and will eat through the root of the plant. This causes the green grass to turn yellow and start to die off.

When should I treat ants in my lawn?

When deciding whether to treat insects in your lawn, it is important to consider the impact you will be making to the ecosystem in your backyard. While ants can be annoying, they do play an important part in keeping your lawns ecosystem in balance.

Ants not only help control the number of small insects in your lawn, but they are also eaten by other animals in the garden, these include spiders, frogs and lizards. This means that when there is a balanced number of ants in your lawn, removing them will create a loss of food source for other animals living in your yard.

However, when there is a large infestation of ants, a pesticide may be required.

How to stop an ant infestation

There are a few different options that you can choose from when treating ants in your lawn. 2 Popular options are:

Battle Insecticide
SureFire Fipronil

When using these products, always use as per the label instructions.

If you are in need of advice to identify and treat issues with your lawn, get in touch with your local Lawn Solutions Australia expert.

Charlie Albone shares his favourite gardening products

Posted on March 31, 2021 by Sarah

There are a lot of gardening products on the market, some are great…. Others not so much and I have been lucky to try a lot of them out. When it comes to keeping a perfect lawn here’s what I recommend.

Auto Mower

My number one favourite landscaping product has to be my robotic auto mower. Mine is a Husqvarna but Gardena and other companies also make them. I was dubious of the robot I now know as “Nigel” as I thought it might take the romanticism out of the garden, but it has in fact changed my life for the better. I spend a lot less time on lawn maintenance and much more time on garden maintenance and lawn health.

There are guide wires that sit under the lawn that keep the mower contained and it is programmed to come out, cut the lawn and return to base when low on battery or the allotted time is up.

The benefits of an auto mower are twofold, firstly the time it saves you. This extra time can then be spent focusing on other plants or overall health of the lawn…. Or dare I say sitting and relaxing in the space. You also always have a well-maintained lawn, so you’re not embarrassed if somebody just pops in unexpectedly.

Secondly, an auto mower is much better for the health of the lawn it cuts. By taking off only a small amount you never risk scalping and the cut the blades make are clean and rarely fray the end of the grass. You also allow the clippings to return to the soil so you’re not draining the soil of its nutrients as fast as if you took the clippings away.

Secateurs and edging shears

Clean cuts are vital in all garden pruning as frayed ends increase the surface area pathogens and diseases can get into the plant. To get a clean cut you need sharp tools, when it comes to pruning shrubs and perennials, I love my Felco secateurs and I keep them sharp by running a sharpening stone over them before and after I’ve used them. For a lawn, if its small I like to use long handles edging shears on my edges for a professional crisp finish. I started using these whilst I was in England, partly as my boss at the time hated the noise of petrol-powered edger’s and partly due to the health of the lawn, you never risk scalping a section of edging. Keep these sharp with a stone sharpening tool like you would secateurs or hedging shears.

Whipper snipper

If you have a larger lawn and edging shears simply are not practical, you’ll need a whipper snipper to tidy up the perimeter (even with the robot mower working). I love battery powered as they are clean, low noise and give a great finish. When selecting a whipper snipper get one with a reversible head, like mine, so you can throw the clippings back onto the lawn rather than into the garden or on the path the lawn boarders as this will make clean up a breeze.

I think good edges really take a good lawn to great lawn status so why not define them and show them off. I love sandstone banding around the edge as it gives a sense of formality and restraint but for a modern look corten or weathering steel gives a crisp modern finish too.

Watering and irrigation systems

All good lawns require water and irrigation systems have come a long way. Modern systems have weather stations communicating via Apps with the Bureau of meteorology to predict rainfall and adjusting the water usage accordingly.

However, I’m old school, I still love my hose and old galvanised watering can I have however fitted a water usage gauge to tell me how much water I have put on my lawn, this allows me to know how much is just enough and then I don’t waste excessive water.

How To Identify Lawn Grubs

Posted on January 9, 2025October 30, 2025 by Sarah

If you find your lawn afflicted with the curse of the lawn grubs like African Black Beetle Larvae or Armyworm, don’t despair. Treating and eradicating these pests is relatively easy.

Skip to: What are the common signs of lawn grubs? How can I do a grub test? How can I treat lawn grubs? How can I prevent lawn grubs?

Here’s some signs to look out for:

Increased bird activity on your lawn

One of the most easily spotted symptoms is an increase in bird activity on your lawn. These grubs make a great snack for the local birds and you’ll find them popping over to your place for lunch!

Greyish-brown moths (Armyworm moth)

Small, greyish brown moths fly around looking out for the healthiest lawn to leave their eggs on, giving their larvae the best chance of survival. These moths can be seen flying around just above the grass normally around dusk. These moths lay their eggs en masse, and in 2–5 days these eggs become grub larvae. These caterpillars are the critters doing the damage as they spend between 18–24 days chewing through your beautiful lawn before becoming pupae and around 5–8 days later moths and so the cycle begins again!

Brown patches in your lawn

As your lawn recovers from the winter chill and spring sees your lawn becoming greener, especially after your spring fertilising. Keep an eye out for brown patches that stay brown. You can lift some of the grass in the patches and if lawn grubs are the culprit you’ll find that the grass will roll up like a carpet, as it has no roots.

Spongy lawn

A spongy lawn can also be a good indicator of grub activity.

Grub test

If you are unsure if you have grubs in your lawn, it is best to do a grub test. To do a grub test, mix a bucket of soapy water and pour it over the edge of an affected area (where the grass is brown or dry). Keep an eye on it and after about 10 minutes or so. Usually, if they are there, they will come up to the surface. This test is best done at dawn or dusk when they are most likely to be active.

How to treat lawn grubs

So how do you fix it? We recommend using a fast acting knock down insecticide like Lawn Solutions Battle Insecticide. Battle Insecticide is a powerful knockdown and residual pesticide that works through direct contact and by residual action as the pest comes into contact with treated surfaces.

Prevention

Unfortunately attacks by these grubs can happen to any lawn and can occur numerous times during a season.

This is why we recommend Grub Guard Ultimate, Acelepryn GR, Acelepryn Liquid. Acelepryn provides safe and effective control of black beetle while minimising the impact on the environment and non-target organisms, such as bees and earthworms.

Acelepryn powered products target pests such as black beetle, stem weevil, cut worm and army worm. The great thing about Acelepryn in comparison to other pesticides, is that it’s preventative. This is why spring is a great time to spread it out, protecting your lawn for up to six months.

For more advice contact your local Lawn Solutions Australia turf supplier, and send those grubs packing.