Why It’s Important to Aerate and Overseed
What is Aeration?
There is more to a healthy lawn than just watering and cutting it. A beautiful lawn needs a good foundation and that foundation is the soil in which it grows. Aeration is needed on a regular basis to keep your lawn’s foundation healthy. This is where our experienced ProLawn technicians come in. They provide core aeration which removes small, finger sized plugs of soil and thatch from the lawn and deposit it on the soil’s surface. Within these plugs are microbes that live just below the surface. These microbes begin to chew away the layer of thatch and over time, that layer turns into a form of compost that is actually beneficial to the lawn. Eventually, the small holes will fill back in with surrounding topsoil, giving your lawn’s root system more room to develop and spread out.
Why does your lawn need Aeration?
It’s simple: Most of the soils in our area have high clay content. This clay tends to compact which inhibits the turf’s ability to uptake moisture and nutrients as well as reducing healthy root growth.
Aeration provides the means to loosen the soil to correct this compaction problem. Also, over time, your lawn will naturally build up thatch. Thatch is simply an intermingled layer
consisting of dead stems, roots, and leaves. This layer builds between actively growing grass and the soil underneath it; when the layer becomes too thick, it prevents water, nutrients and flow of air from reaching the soil layer. Aeration assists in reducing this problem of thatch build up.
For healthy grass to keep growing on your lawn aeration needs to be part of your lawn maintenance.
There are several benefits for core aeration. The most obvious one is that it helps rejuvenate your lawn and keeps it looking healthy. Other benefits include:
What is Overseeding?
Would you like to your lawn to be thicker, greener, and have greater resistance to disease and drought? Who wouldn’t, right!?! While having such a lawn doesn’t happen overnight, it is more
attainable than you might think. Overseeding, when done at the right time of year (i.e. late summer or early fall, NOT in spring!) is an incredibly important step to getting a thicker, greener, more disease and drought tolerant lawn.
Overseeding is simply the planting of new seed directly onto existing turf, without ripping out the existing turf or replacing the soil. Have bare spots? Overseed. Have a thin lawn? Overseed. Have a “tired, worn out” looking lawn? Overseed!
If you have an older, established lawn, chances are it is full of turf grasses not meant for the way today’s homeowner uses outdoor space. Even if you have a newer lawn, if you’re in a subdivision, the turf many builders install offers a short term “wow” factor but isn’t necessarily meant to stand the test of time – or foot and paw traffic!
Why Does Overseeding Work?
By overseeding newer strains of turf grass developed specifically for the soil and climate conditions of ProLawn’s service area, you can help an established lawn better tolerate insects, disease, drought, and heavy foot traffic. Investing in overseeding can also mean reducing the need for fertilizing, watering, and pesticides to keep your lawn healthy. The biggest benefit of all – a renovated lawn remains greener and grows thicker and healthier!
The best time to Overseed is – Late Summer or Early Fall! The soil and temperatures are at an optimum for both seed germination and growth at this time of year here in Northern Virginia. We have enough moisture and sunlight this time of year too for new seedlings to be well established before the cooler fall weather takes hold. An added bonus to overseeding at this time of year is weed competition is significantly lower than in the spring growing season. Learn more from the experts at the Virginia Cooperative Extension HERE.
Want the Pros at ProLawn to help? Give us a call or text RENO at 800-776-5296 to get a FREE Quote
for Aeration & Overseeding Services Today!
