Two of the best services that you can do for your lawn include aeration and topdressing. But we find that people are often confused about what these services involve and what order they should be performed in.
In this article, we’ll answer all your questions about aeration and topdressing including whether to top dress before or after aeration.
We’ll cover:
What is aeration?
What is topdressing?
Topdress before or after aeration?
When to perform aeration and topdressing?
Can I handle aeration and topdressing myself?
After reading this article, you’ll have a much better grasp on what’s needed to produce the healthiest lawn on the block.
Lawn aeration is the process of making holes throughout your lawn by pulling small soil plugs (called “cores”) with a special machine called a core aerator.
By doing this, it allows more oxygen, water, and nutrients to penetrate deep into the soil and down to the root zone. That’s important because it creates a more favorable environment for the root system to grow. Healthier roots add up to a healthier lawn.
Lawn aeration in Texas is so important due to our sandy loam soil type, which is prone to compaction. This can make it difficult for oxygen, water, and nutrients to get to where they are needed.
Simply put, topdressing a lawn is merely the act of spreading a thin layer of material across it. People topdress their lawns with soil, compost, and sand, depending upon what they’re trying to achieve.
At Grassperson, we like to topdress lawns with a high-quality, composted material that adds valuable microbial activity to improve soil health. This can be done to fill in uneven spots and also just to boost the overall health of the lawn.
We also like topdressing a lawn with a thick-grain sand, particularly after lawn aeration. This is because of the high clay content in our Texas soil type. Nutritional soil will help to loosen compaction and improve soil drainage.
You can expect greater benefits when you topdress after aeration. Well explain why in the next section.
People sometimes want to know: What comes after aeration? As with any service, timing is important.
One of the best things that you can do following an aeration service is topdressing. When you topdress the lawn immediately after aeration, that topdressing material will be more likely to fall into the holes that were made and contribute to the effort to loosen your compacted soil.
When we are topdressing a lawn after aeration, we are using a turbocharged compost mix blended with varying amounts of sand. This is because we have such a high clay content in our soil type. It is important to add nutritional sand to help loosen compaction and improve drainage. Lawn aeration combined with a topdressing will go a really long way in improving the overall health and performance of your lawn.
That being said, you don’t have to aerate at the time of topdressing. There are definitely specific benefits to performing these services together (and if you are going to aerate, we definitely recommend that you take the extra step of also topdressing).
But because topdressing can also help enhance the overall soil health of your lawn by introducing microbial activity, it’s also just a healthy practice to improve the overall performance of your lawn. It can help your lawn to stand up against some fungal lawn diseases that run rampant here in North Texas.
When you perform these services depends on what you’re trying to achieve. If you’re just topdressing a lawn to fill in some bare spots or add microbial activity, and you’re not pairing it with aeration, then you might have some more flexibility in timing.
But there are some important considerations.
If top dressing with compost, we recommend early spring or late fall so that you are outside of the most active growing season. That’s because top dressing can block some of the lawn’s access to sun and oxygen and you don’t want this beneficial service to end up causing any harm.
If you’re aerating and topdressing together, then you’ll want to consider the best time to aerate.
Aerating lawns in Texas can occur in both the spring and the fall. A lot of it has to do with the soil temperature. You don’t want it to be too hot or you’ll risk drying out the grassroots of your existing grass. However, the milder temperatures of both spring and fall make those seasons ideal.
Inevitably, we always have folks ask us about handling these services themselves. It’s definitely true that you can rent an aerator and perform aeration on your own. But there are some important considerations to keep in mind.
For one, it’s more time-consuming and laborious than the average homeowner has bargained for. It involves pushing a heavy piece of machinery around your property. You’ll also have to coordinate renting and transporting the machine.
Plus, very few people really want to spend their time performing aeration on their own when they have better things to be doing.
Homeowners are also sometimes dissatisfied with a DIY aeration job. A rented aerator is more likely to be clunky and perform a subpar job than commercial equipment used by a professional.
The same is all true for topdressing.
We often find that homeowners think that topdressing a lawn is as simple as just tossing down some material. In reality, it is a pretty labor-intensive job that can be quite time-consuming. You also want to get the topdressing spread to about ¼ to ⅜ thick evenly throughout the lawn. This can be challenging without professional equipment.
For these reasons, we think it’s something that is best left to the professionals. Besides the fact that you probably don’t want to spend a weekend doing this, you also want to make sure it’s done right so that you fully gain all of the benefits.
Whether you are interested in aeration and topdressing or another lawn service, working with a professional will help you get the best results.
At Grassperson, we’re here to help however you need us. Hopefully this article has given you some helpful advice on two vital services in Texas and how they can be handled. But there are many other decisions that will also need to be made for your lawn and we can help guide you.
If you are on the hunt for a lawn care provider in North Texas, we’d love for you to consider Grassperson. We’ll help you put your worries to rest and get your lawn back on track to being the best on the block.
Ready to get a worry-free lawn at your Flower Mound, Highland Village, or Lewisville, TX home? Get a free quote and get ready to enjoy the best lawn on the block with no hassles on your end.