5 Tricks for Perfect Lawn Aeration in Kansas

Your lawn isn’t just a set-it-and-forget-it feature of your landscape. Whether you decide to tend it with your own two hands or with the assistance of a professional landscaper, you should always take steps to make sure it stays healthy and beautiful. You’ve probably thought about weeding, mowing, and irrigation among other lawn care activities, but have you given much thought to lawn aeration?

Why Is Lawn Aeration Important in Kansas?

Kansas is an agricultural hub, but that doesn’t mean our soil is perfect. While it’s great for growing crops and vegetation, when Kansas soil isn’t cared for, it can become brittle and loose, making it prone to compaction. This is why aeration is absolutely key to a healthy landscape! Core aeration pulls 1-3 inch plugs of soil and turf from the lawn and leaves them on the surface to melt back in to the soil profile within a few weeks. Creating these holes helps eliminate thatch, introduces oxygen back in to the rootzone (which is needed for healthy turf), aids in relieving compaction, helps roots spread laterally, and helps water and fertilizers filtrate into the soil profile.

Lawn Aeration Tips and Tricks for Yards in the Topeka, KS Area

These tips and tricks are essential to proper lawn aeration, whether you do it yourself or call on a professional landscaper:

Have the right tools for the job. There are two types of lawn aeration methods. One is “spike” aerating, which is essentially just jabbing holes in the lawn. What you want is a tool that performs plug aeration. With this tool, you’ll both poke some holes, and the machine will pull up the “plugs” of soil from the holes it creates. The process reduces soil compaction and provides an excellent base for overseeding!
Avoid working with dry soil. Dry soil can make aerating a massive headache. It’s messy, harder than it needs to be, and the results won’t come out as well. Schedule your aeration after a solid rain, or wet your lawn on your own before beginning.
Aerate during early spring or fall. You don’t really want to go digging up the landscape in the middle of growing season. You could end up with some spots that simply don’t have ample time to heal.
Make use of the plugs. After you aerate, allow the plugs to dry up a bit and then break them up across your landscape to make everything more uniform and to distribute the loose soil. You can get this done with a lawnmower, though it can dull your blade. For a safer but more painstaking option, use a gardening tool to break them up, like a rake.
Take advantage of aerating. The result of aeration is healthier, fertile, and overall easier-to-manage soil. So make sure you use this to your advantage! Aerating and seeding go together exceptionally well, and by doing both you will end up with a healthy, uniform landscape that is exceptionally attractive and less prone to growth issues and complications.

Comprehensive Lawn Care and Aeration in Topeka, Kansas

Don’t have time to aerate your lawn, or have a large property that needs aeration? If yes, then our landscaping experts would be happy to provide the help you need! Contact Topeka Landscape today to learn more!