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Aeration and Overseeding

Overseeding and Aeration

A healthy yard starts in late summer and it is the perfect time to schedule your annual aeration and overseeding treatment. Building up your turf now will ensure a lush green lawn come next summer! Any lawn can benefit from yearly aeration. But your lawn should definitely be aerated if:

It gets heavy use by children and pets running around the yard.
It dries out easily and has a spongy feel. This could mean your lawn has an excessive thatch problem. Thatch is a layer of dead grass that creates a barrier between the grass and soil.
If the thatch layer is greater than one-half inch, lawn aeration is recommended.
If your lawn was established by sod, and soil layering exists. Sod, which comes with finer-textured soil, is often laid down over existing coarser soil. This is called soil layering, and it disrupts drainage because water is held in the fine-textured soil, leading to poor root development and compacted soil. Lawn aeration breaks up the layering, allowing water to flow through the soil more easily and reach the roots.

Repairing Summer’s Damage

The summer creates a tough environment on your lawn with everything from intense heat, direct sunlight, drought, insect and disease pressure. Plus, most people are using their lawns in the summer and of that foot traffic can take a toll on the turf. Aeration is a process that removes thousands of small ‘plugs’ of turf and soil from your lawn. This allows water and nutrients more direct access to your turf’s roots while reducing thatch buildup. Aeration also goes hand in hand with over-seeding (seeding existing turf areas). Overseeding is the planting of grass seed directly into existing turf, without tearing up the turf, or the soil" The numerous holes created by aeration expose new seeds directly to the soil and shelters them from wind, animals, or other elements – increasing their viability.