Which Is Better Spike Or Plug Aerator
Plug aerators are usually more effective at relieving compaction in lawns with a heavy clay soil since the solid tines used on spike aerators compact the clay soil further when they push into the ground. Soils that crumble easily are usually high in loam and sand which benefit more from the use of a spike aerator.
Should You Aerate Your Lawn:
The most common question among homeowners is how to determine whether their lawn is a good candidate for aeration. Here are some tips.
- If your lawn get heavy use, such as children and pets routinely running around the yard. These activities contribute to soil compaction.
- If your lawn was created as part of a newly constructed home. Often, grass is established on subsoil and compacted by construction traffic, leaving the topsoil stripped or buried.
- If your lawn has a dried out and spongy feel to it. This is an indicator that you may have an excessive thatch problem. Use a shovel and remove a 4 inch slice of the lawn. If the thatch layer is greater than one-half inch, aeration is recommended.
- If your lawn was established using sod that leaves a soil layering of finer texture over the existing courser soil. This finer layer disrupts the drainage, leads to compacted conditions and causes poor root development. Aerating will break up the layering and allow water to flow more freely to reach the roots.
Best Time To Aerate And Overseed Your Lawn
Theres nothing better than a lush lawn that lets you spend time with your family in the back yard, laughing and having fun. But, to keep grass healthy, techniques such as overseeding and aeration are important. This leads us to the question, when is the best time to aerate and overseed your lawn?
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You Fight Weeds Too Early
Weed control can work wonders keeping invasive growth at bay on a healthy turf, but chemicals and herbicides can harm seedings roots and fresh blades. Even organic and natural solutions can cause stress on the young plants, so its often best to wait until your grass is strong before laying down any weed control substances. We advise waiting until youve mowed your new grass four to five times before tackling any emerging weeds.
Why Do It In The Fall
In Southern Ontario, most of our lawns are made up of cool-season grasses. This means that there are two prime opportunities each year to reap the greatest rewards from aeration, the high growth periods in early Spring and Fall. One advantage to Fall aeration is that the increase in seed & soil contact will make your overseeding efforts more successful, leading to a fuller lawn after the Winter. Seeds in the Spring face increased competition from aggressive weed seeds, which are fighting for the same nutrients to germinate and grow. Seeds from buried weeds can also be brought to the surface during the aeration process, helping them to take root when done in the Spring.
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Lawn Care : When To Aerate Your Lawn
Spring time! Flowers are growing – green time! It is almost officially spring according to the calendar, hopefully the warmer weather follows. When the weather breaks, it is time for some yard work to make our lawns beautiful for the year. You may be looking at your lawn knowing it needs to be aerated, but you keep putting the treatments off because it seems too hard. Aeration is a simple way to give your yard a healthy lawn. You just have take the time to get it done. You can do it yourself by renting the equipment or you can pick up the phone and hire a professional lawn care company to do all of the hard work. Lets make this the year to aerate. Make your lawn happy and healthy again by relieving compaction. Core aeration is a great way to keep your lawn green and lush, so lets talk about when to aerate your lawn this year.
What Is The Next Step After Aeration
After Aeration Overseed and Fertilize Immediately after aeration, your lawn is ripe for overseeding and fertilizing. The holes provide excellent soil exposure for seeds and deliver fertilizer directly to the roots of your grass. For best results, use high-quality seed and fertilize with Milorganite®.
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Why Should You Aerate Your Lawn
Aeration is one of the most important lawn maintenance treatments of the year. Experienced lawn maintenance professionals and gardeners will study the soil to gauge the compaction and determine if it needs aeration. Here are some reasons why you might need lawn aeration in Toronto:
When is the Best Time to Aerate Your Lawn?
If you hire lawn maintenance services, you do not need to concern yourself with the lawn care schedule. Experts usually customize their aeration schedule according to the soil conditions, weather, and the type of grass. The best time to aerate the lawn is just before the growing season. This allows the grass to heal and develop stronger roots. The grass roots will spread to areas where you have removed the soil plugs and gain a fresh supply of air.
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When Lawns Need Aeration
It may not seem your lawn could get compacted, but it happens easier than you may think. Vehicles or small equipment driven on lawns are more obvious offenders, but even outdoor entertaining or yard play by kids and pets can leave all or part of your lawn compacted. If you live where heavy clay soil is the norm, annual aeration is probably needed to keep your lawn from becoming thin and weak.
Dethatching and aerating are two different tasks, but they often go hand in hand. Thatch is the layer of decomposing organic matter that forms right at the lawn surface, between soil and grass. When thatch gets more than 1/2 inch thick, it works like compaction to prevent the flow of air, water and nutrients grasses need. Aggressive spreading grasses, such as Kentucky bluegrassin northern lawns and Bermudagrass down south, form more thatch than many other grass types. Aeration helps penetrate and reduce thatch buildup or prep it for removal through dethatching.
If your grass often looks stressed and your soil is hard to the touch or rainwater puddles up where it used to be absorbed, you may have compaction problems. Confirm your suspicions with a simple “screwdriver test.” Take a regular screwdriver and stick it into your lawn’s soil by hand. It should slide in fairly easily. If you meet resistance, your soil is compacted, and aeration can help.
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When Should You Aerate Your Lawn In The Spring
The key to a luscious lawn is ensuring that the plants receive sufficient nutrients to grow. To achieve this, you have to engage in basic lawn care practices, including watering, mowing, weeding, aeration, etc.
Aeration is one of the vital aspects of lawn maintenance. The process, which is also known as core aeration, improves the growth of the roots and generates a robust, more luscious garden.
Aerating Tools: Plug Aerator Vs Spike Aerator
Two main aerating tools exist a spike aerator and a plug aerator. With a spike aerator, you simply use the tool to poke holes into the ground with a solid tine, or fork. Plug aerators remove a core or plug of grass and soil from the lawn. For the best results, use an aerating tool or machine that actually removes plugs of soil. Poking holes is less effective and can actually cause additional compaction in the areas around the holes.
Look for an aerating tool or machine that removes soil plugs approximately 2 3 inches deep and 0.5 0.75 inches in diameter, and about 2 3 inches apart. These machines can be rented from lawn and garden stores or home improvement centers. Always follow the directions provided by the store. You may want to consider sharing the rental cost with a neighbor who is interested in aerating the lawn.
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Argument : Wont Using A Pre
Again, refer to the timing of our program. We will be overseeding between March 1 and March 21. Kentucky bluegrass is the slowest species of grass to germinate, taking up to 2-4 weeks. Other species in our seed mix, tall fescue, and rye take 1-2 weeks and about 1 week to germinate respectively. Doing the math, almost all seed will have germinated by April 21, just in time for our dithiopyr application.
In the literature on dithiopyr, crabgrass is the only plant mentioned to be susceptible to the herbicide after germination . This leads us to believe that once grass seed has germinated, there is little to no risk applying dithiopyr.
How To Dethatch Your Lawn
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What Is Lawn Aeration Why When And How To Do It
Maintaining a beautiful lawn is not an easy task. That is of course if youre not employing essential lawn care practices such as well-timed mowing, watering and fertilizing. But those aside, its also extremely important to ensure that the soil beneath your grass gets lots of nutrients. And what better way to do that than by aerating your lawn!
Lawn aeration is crucial for a healthy lawn, as it allows air, water, and other nutrients to easily penetrate built-up grass and lawn thatch.
So if youre new to lawn aeration, this article is just the thing for you. Here you will find everything you need to know about lawn aeration along with some handy tips.
Get rid of thatch and make way for a beautiful lawn with this quick guide to aeration. Youll learn why, how, and when to aerate your lawn for the best results.
You Dont Choose The Right Equipment
Weve all seen the do-it-yourselfers walking across their lawn in cleats, poking holes in the soil. Instead of investing in an aeration machine, they think aerating is just about creating holes but actually, the concentrated force of stepping with a spiked shoe further compacts your soil. Even spike aerators, which use a solid tine or fork to poke holes, can cause additional compaction in the areas around the holes.
For best results, use a plug aerator, which removes a core, or plug, of grass and soil from your lawn. Look for an aerating tool or machine that removes soil plugs approximately two to three inches deep and roughly half to three quarters of an inch in diameter, about two to three inches apart.
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Why Should You Aerate The Lawn
Aeration is an essential step in lawn maintenance. Unfortunately, many property owners dont realize this and try to cut corners by skipping it. Some assume that just adding water to the soil is enough to keep it loose and aerated. Here are some reasons why you shouldnt skip aeration:
As you can see, aeration is an important aspect of lawn care and will ensure it remains healthy. Proper and thorough aeration should be performed every year in order to maintain your lawns health. We recommend you call professionals to handle the task as they will have the right tools, skills, and knowledge.
How Does Core Aeration Work
A core aerator machine pulls out plugs of soil in your lawn to leave pockets for air and water to get through and leave room for root growth. It is important to use core aeration methods because using spikes to just poke holes in the ground could cause further compaction. The plugs of soil that were taken out by the aerator will break down and give more nutrients to your lawn. The cost of aerating your lawn depends on the size of your lawn. If you want to DIY or hire a lawn care company, there are other treatments you want to do with aeration.
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The Best Time To Aerate Your Lawn
For the best results when overseeding, our lawn aeration service advises you aerate before planting. The purpose of aeration is to break up the soil and allow it to breathe. That way new grass roots can penetrate deeper into the soil and have access to more nutrients. When should you aerate cool-season grasses and warm-season grasses?
The trick is to aerate right before overseeding. The best time to have lawn care services aerate your lawn in Midwest locations is usually around August or September. In warmer states, aerate in late spring or early summer.
Why Do We Need To Aerate
Lawn aeration is a treatment used when the soil in your lawn is compacted. A lawn can become easily compacted if a lot of action goes on in your yard. Parking cars on your lawn, animals running around, and kids playing on the lawn are just some common ways soil can become compacted. Compacted soils make it so water and air do not reach the roots of the grass in your lawn, leaving your lawn lacking the nutrients it needs to be healthy. If you live in an area with clay soils, your soil is more likely to become compacted than areas with sandy soils. The bonds in the clay soil are much closer together, making it difficult for water and air to penetrate to the roots.
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Reasons To Hire A Professional
Investing in professional lawn aeration presents a number of advantages, beyond freeing up your time for other activities.
Professional lawn care companies have the right equipment, allowing the job to be done quickly and correctly. Theres no need to buy or rent an aerator. Professionals have a better understanding of your lawns needs and will know the best time to aerate and overseed your lawn. Not only will they time the aeration correctly, but they will also apply the right balance of fertilizer and seed post-aeration to ensure the best grass possible. More peace of mind. Many lawn care companies will offer a guarantee of results and will keep working on your yard until you are satisfied. If you DIY, you may spend hundreds of dollars on supplies, only to be disappointed or frustrated by the results. Professionals will properly prep the lawn for aeration to ensure the best results.
As always, there are some pros and cons to hiring a professional. However, by the time you acquire the right equipment, you may spend about the same amount of cash either way.
If you dont have time to invest in aerating your lawn, contact TruGreen so you can have an envy-worthy lawn to make the neighbors turn their heads.
What Is The Best Month To Aerate
For the best results, you must select an optimum time of the year to aerate your lawn. The type of grass in your lawn is the main factor behind the timing of your aeration. You want to aerate the lawn during peak growing season.
Warm-season grasses, like St. Augustine and Bermudagrass, have peak growth during late spring to early summer. April to June is their ideal aeration period. Cool-season grasses including Perennial ryegrass and Kentucky bluegrass are best aerated from September to November or March to April.
As weve already touched on above, the frequency of aeration depends on the nature of your soil. But most academic sources give the estimated number of aerations per year at 1 to 2. The College of Agriculture and Life Sciences atVirginia Polytechnic Institute and State University recommend at least once per year.
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