To reverse the damage done by compacted soil and a buildup of thatch, employ the use of a hollow tine aerator.  These tools, available in both manual and power varieties, create space in the soil for water, nutrients and air to reach the roots.  They are also very helpful in helping you repair your lawn.  They do so by removing chunks of soil with small h0llowed spoons.

Using an aerator is not complicated, though there are some things to think about ahead of time.  The first thing to decide is whether you will use a manual or power aerator.  Manual aerators, also called hand aerators, look a bit like a shovel with several hollow tines at the base.  The tines are inserted into the soil with the force of the operator’s weight.  Because they are time and labor intensive, hand aerators are only recommended for aerating very small areas of land.  For full lawns, you will want to use a power aerator.  These tools look like a large, heavy-duty lawn mower.  They have a cylinder surrounded with hollow tine aerators that remove plugs of soil as the cylinder rotates.  Though far more efficient than the hand aerator, the power core aerator is very powerful and requires some physical strength and endurance to operate it.

Once you have decided which tool to use, you will need to plan when you will aerate.  In most climates, you only need to aerate once a year; however, if you live in a very hot and dry area, you may want to do so twice a year.  It is best to aerate right as the grass begins to grow, so in either late summer/early fall for cool season grasses or in spring for warm season grasses.

Next, you should identify any sprinkler heads and mark them with flags to avoid damaging the aerator or the sprinklers.  On the night before you plan to aerate, thoroughly water your lawn.  This will make the process go more smoothly.

To operate the aerator, set the penetration at its deepest setting, usually about 3”.  Pass over your lawn as you would with a lawn mower – in straight lines, back and forth.  If it has been a long time since you last aerated, your soil is high in clay content, or your thatch is more than ¾ inch thick, you will want to do a second pass perpendicular to your first.  For very severe cases, you may want to do a third pass.

When you are done, you can either rake up the resulting soil plugs or simply wait for them to be reabsorbed into the lawn.   By the time your grass has fully grown, you should see a marked difference in the quality of your lawn.

Learn all about Lawn Aerators!

The type of grass growing in your lawn depends more on the variability of sunlight and the variety of the existing soil, then it does on the outside temperature.

Did you know different type of grasses in different parts of the country grow differently.  Warm weather grasses such as those found in southern California, Florida much of the south and the south eastern coast are thicker, warm weather grasses.

Generally speaking, the hotter it gets, the better warm weather grasses grow. The faster growing time for these grasses is when the weather is between 85 and 95 degrees.  Warm weather grasses are a lot better at repairing themselves or self lawn repair.  They are also more vigorous and grow by shooting rhizomes out in many different directions at once.  Two of the most common types of warm weather grasses are St. Augustine and Bermuda grasses.

Cool weather grasses are a lot different.  These are predominately the types of grasses that grow in the north west.  Although this grass grows like crazy in the spring and the fall, it grows a lot slower in the winter and the summer.  Part of the slow grow in the summer is due to the hardening of the soil. This compacts roots and prevent water absorption.  In the winter, many of backyards in the northwest see less than 4 hours of sunlight a day.

Cool grasses grow in a circular pattern and are far less vigorous than warmer grasses.  These grasses also face a few other problems including poor drainage and competition from moss.  Lawns that don’t get a lot of sunlight in the winter may be replaced by moss (which has a shallow root system and needs less sunlight.)  Cool grasses includes different varieties of fescue and ryegrass.

The best way to maintain a lawn healthier is to mow higher and mow more often.  As  a general rule don’t moth your lawn under 2 inches and mow regularly so that you never have to cut more than 1/3 of the blade at a time.  Both types of grass benefit from longer, less frequent watering as a method to help develop the roots.