Aeration: Why, How & When to Aerate Your Lawn

There are several benefits of aeration. These include relieving the soil compaction, helping in thatch management, boosting nutrient availability, helping in pH modification, helping in building a thicker lawn, reducing water runoff and pudding and preparing the grass for winter.

How to Aerate a Lawn?

The following are the steps involved in aerating your lawn: 

• Irrigate the Lawn – You should sprinkle the water on dense green grass to prepare adequate aeration. Ensure you thoroughly water the lawn a day or two before starting the aeration process. You should apply at least once an inch of water. 
• Flag your lawn – You should add a yellow flag over your lawn edge. Start using irrigation flags in areas with hidden objects, including tree stumps or irrigation heads. It prevents anyone from entering the lawn when you are aerating it. 
• Aerate your Lawn – Regardless of the method you use for aeration (core or spike), ensure you cover your lawn in one direction and then return over the perpendicular motion.
• Fertilize your lawn – Once you complete your aeration process, you are supposed to fertilize your lawn.

When to Aerate a Lawn?

You may find your lawn becoming compact; however, it is easy to address this issue. Small equipment or some vehicles moving in your yard can create these issues. At the same time, the regular traffic on your lawn with children and pets playing around can have similar problems. 

If your location has heavy clay soil, you need annual aeration to keep your lawn in the right shape and prevent it from becoming weak and thin. The best time to aerate is seeing thatch collected over your lawn. Thatch is a decomposing layer of organic matter collected over the lawn surface. 

When thatch gets over the half-inch thick, it can bring issues like compaction, which further prevents the airflow. The aggressively spreading grasses, including Kentucky bluegrass over northern lawns and even the Bermudagrass down south, can have this problem. 

Although there is no fixed time for aeration, it is typically a good idea to start during the growing season. This is when the grass can easily heal and fill the open spaces, especially after the soil plugs are removed. Most lawn owners with cool-season grass prefer the cool season during the early spring or fall months. Opting for this process during the late spring for warm-season grass is the best choice.

What is Aeration?

The aeration process deals with puncturing the soil, further allowing a good water penetration for introducing more oxygen over the soil. It plays a vital role in indoor gardening. The growth of any plant or grass requires a good amount of nutrients value from the soil where they grow. These nutrients easily dissolve in a soil solution. It is a combination of soil and water surrounding the roots of the plants.  

Soil can absorb and retain water, and the aeration process also helps absorb more. For indoor gardening, the popular option is soil additives. The objective of this process is that soil is exceptionally porous; hence water can easily penetrate the soil. The horticulturists add free bark, dried leaves, grass clippings, and sand to achieve this objective. In other words, these are used for insulation and water retention, which can further boost soil aeration. 

Aeration works in the following three methods: 

1. Diffused air aeration – It is an aeration method that works with compressed air blown inside the sewage and air diffused using the sewage by diffuser. These are further divided into two types – plate and tube diffusers. 
2. Mechanical Aeration – In this method, we can find the sewage agitated aggressively, seeking the help of mechanical equipment that further encourages oxygen absorption from the surroundings. These are two types – horizontal and vertical surface aerators. 
3. Combine Aeration – In this system, the mechanical aeration and diffused air aeration combined, working as one unit. One of the famous examples following this method include Doroco Aerator. 

To know more about aeration, read the article – What is aeration

What to know before the first aeration?

While considering the aeration task, many lawn owners tend to commit mistakes. Let’s check them out: 

1. Improper lawn aeration equipment – You need the right set of tools and equipment for adequate lawn aeration. Choosing aeration shoes for big lawns can be a bad idea for your lawn aeration process. Hence know the appropriate list of tools before you start aeration.  
2. Choosing the wrong season – Aeration is done when new grass seeds are on your lawn. It helps in developing deep and strong roots. Fall is often the ideal time for considering this process and preventing this mistake. 
3. Neglecting moisture – If you intend to aerate your lawn, it is bad to do it when the soil is dry. It can have several problems as the soil is hard and compact. Moisture content plays a vital role in this process. So, ensure you water your space before carrying out the aeration process. 
4. Premature Mowing – Once your lawn is fed with seed aeration, breathing requires some time. However, people tend to mow the grass soon, which is a big mistake to avoid. Maintain a gap of four weeks before you choose the one. 
5. Premature weed killing – Like early mowing, if you intend to kill the weeds on your lawn in the early days using any chemical, you can damage the young grass sprouts. Allow the weed to grow and then aerate, as it will give you a good result.

What are the Aeration Tools?

Although there are several tools for aeration procedures, only two tools – spike and plug aerator are regarded as the most vital. Spike aerators help you poke holes into your yard using a solid tine or fork. On the other hand, plug aerators remove a plug or core of soil and grass from the yard. Let’s check them in detail: 

1. Plug Aerator

Plug aerators are manual tools that are essential in aerating your lawn. It helps churn your lawn to promote airflow and boost grass growth in a yard. This tool effectively digs a deeper hole in the ground and makes bigger holes than spike aerators. 

The larger holes help the landowner enjoy better seedlings, which grow deeper with strong roots and allow a sound trap water system. Plug aerators are more effective for lawn aeration. However, it demands more physical labor, and the best part is that these are not required to be used too often on your lawn. 

Plug aerators are found in different forms; however, a few of their attributes remain common among the various types. These are wheeled equipment and look like a seed spreader or lawnmower. These also carry hollow, short and cylindrical protrusions over their axles. The installed cylinders help dig the ground and then get rid of the soil’s cores. 

These are often known as expensive tools but are always a worthy investment. These are ineffective for large lawns and useful only for small yards with compacted soil. These are used primarily on small-sized lawns and effectively make big-sized holes in the ground. Explore more about power raking vs. aeration.

2. Spike Aerator

A spike aerator is essential for lawn owners, especially with a vast lawn. You can find spike aeration working smoothly, but it offers short-term results. Spike aerator can help poke holes and move ahead over the ground with some fork or solid tine. 

Spike aerators play an essential role in loosening the soil and allowing improved access to everyone. It helps make the soil loose and eliminate the compaction in the short term. However, it also boosts the contraction in the long run. Spike aerators help improve upon accessing the surface. It can assist in overseeing the option. 

It proves effective for lawns having minor to moderate compaction problems. These tools help promote water and airflow inside the soil; however, it does not mean that these remain compacted plugs. It will rise over the surface again and gain quick attention very soon. 

This mechanically operated tool has one downside, you cannot use it too often, and it does not go as large or deep as plug aerators. Hence if you are working in any yard which has higher traffic, this tool will not be able to help you. All you need to do is to rely on plug aerators.

In conclusion, follow these steps to aerate your lawn ‒ irrigate it, flag it before starting the process, aerate it and fertilize it. The best time to aerate is fall, as it helps in aerating your lawn, thus allowing the grass seed to germinate and develop a robust root system before winter arrives.   

At Eden, you will get professional aeration services that can help keep the space excellent and green. You can contact us to visit your yard and gain a competitive solution. For details, you can see Eden’s website.