Aerating your lawn is important as it allows an easier movement of nutrients, water and air in your lawn. By aerating, you are allowing the nutrients to move further into soil to reach the roots. It also helps your soil to keep water for a longer period of time.
Under normal conditions, aerating your lawn once a year is good enough to keep in it in good state of health. If you live in a warmer climate area, the recommendation is to aerate in the late spring. On the other hand, it is advisable to aerate in the fall if you live in an area with cooler climate. Summer is a bad time to do aeration, as your lawn will be stressed under the summer heat.
However, you may need to aerate as soon as you can if you notice your lawn is not behaving correctly. Some signs of problems included fertilized grasses not turning green and certain parts of your lawn remained flat after you have applied water and fertilizers. This usually indicated that your soil is compacted and prevents water and nutrients from reaching the grass roots.
Changing Aerating Needs
If you have kids and pets playing in your lawn on a daily basis, you may have to aerate more than once a year, as frequent movement on the lawn will cause the soil to compact at a faster pace.
If your lawn is prone to rapid thatch buildup, you will need to aerate your lawn more than once a year. Thatches make it difficult for water, air and nutrients to reach the grass roots. This in turn will cause the grasses to die off and make your lawn look like a vacant lot.
If you have a sloppy lawn, water tends to run off quickly before it can soak into the soil. By aerating it more often, more water can reach the grass roots and help your lawn grow.
If your lawn soil is heavy in clay, you will also need to aerate more often as clay soil has poor air circulation and is slow to absorb water. In this case, frequent aeration will allow more water, nutrients and air to the reach the grass roots.
By aerating at least once or twice a year, you will help your lawn to remain greener, fuller and healthier throughout the seasons.
Jack Greenwood is the webmaster of GreenLawnCareTips.com where he provides more information on lawn care and maintenance. Sign up for a free 7-part lawn care mini course at this site today!