When it comes to growing a healthy lawn, nothing is more frustrating than constantly keeping up on mowing and watering only to have it brown or grow in patchy. In order to give your lawn a fighting chance, many lawn care professionals aerate their lawn once or twice a year to get that lush green lawn every homeowner wants.
Unfortunately, not a lot of homeowners know what aeration is or the benefits it provides for your lawn. That is why the experts at Dial Environmental created this article, to make sure you know how to get the best looking lawn in the neighborhood!
What is Lawn Aeration?
Simply put, lawn aeration is a process that basically involves opening up your lawn so it can breathe and grow. Aerating consists of going across your lawn, typically with an aerator, and pulling about 3 inch plugs out of the ground. By plugging the grass it opens up for water, nutrients, and oxygen to penetrate the roots easier, allowing it to grow.
Overtime thatch will build up between the green grass and soil, making it difficult for the grass to continue to grow, which is where aerating comes in handy.
When to Aerate Your Lawn?
The best time to aerate your lawn depends on when the peak growing season is for your specific grass. For the cooler weather grasses, such as Kentucky Bluegrass or perennial ryegrass, you’ll want to aerate in the early spring or fall time. If you have warmer weather grass, like Bermuda Grass or St. Augustine Grass, then late spring into early summer is perfect.
Typically Aeration doesn’t need to occur every year for the average lawn, but if there is an exceptionally higher traffic area or clay soil, then aerating every year might be necessary. Aerating your lawn out of it’s peak season could result in a very slow regrow phase or possibly no regrowth at all!
Lawn Aeration Tips – Before and After
Before you aerate your lawn, you will want to take some time the day before and water the grass you’re going to be aerating. About an inch of water will suffice, you want to ensure that the lawn is going to be completely muddy and soaked when you’re aerating, but not dry and stiff. Additionally, you’ll want to rake up any thatch sitting on top of the grass to ensure the new grass can grow in.
After you’ve finished aerating the lawn, overseeding and fertilizing are the next best thing you can do. With the lawn freshly aerated the seeds and fertilizer have a much higher effectiveness because they can penetrate below the surface and begin to flourish and grow. The holes allow easy access for the fertilizer to be absorbed at the roots and the seeds to grow under the soil quickly, rather than being stuck on top.
Why is Aerating Your Lawn Important?
Just like you and me, your lawn needs to be able to breathe in order to grow and thrive. If you do not aerate your lawn your grass will surely begin to slowly die out over time. Aerating opens up the lawn and allows room for more growth that otherwise would never have the same potential.
Hire a Professional to Aerate Your Lawn
Lawn aeration is not really an easy process and the aerating machines are actually costly, especially since it really only needs to be done roughly every 2-3 years. Dial Environmental has the years of experience and know-how to properly and effectively aerate your lawn. Place your trust in experts that will get the job done right the first time and yield maximum gains.
Contact Dial Environmental today and ask about how our aeration and lawn care program will have your lawn and yard bolstering in no time.