Author: Rachel Southin

When and How to Aerate a Lawn

Posted on by Rachel Southin

A lush and vibrant lawn is a source of pride for many homeowners, but achieving that vibrant green carpet requires a little extra care. One of the most beneficial practices for maintaining a healthy lawn is aeration. In this blog, we will delve into when and how to aerate your lawn, covering both DIY and hand aeration methods.

Lawn aeration is the process of perforating the soil with holes to allow air, water, and nutrients to penetrate the grassroots more effectively. Lawn aeration helps alleviating soil compaction and enhancing the grass’s access to vital resources. By aerating your lawn, you can significantly improve its health and promote robust grass growth, making it more resilient against pests and drought.

Why Should You Aerate Your Lawn

Aerating your lawn comes with a multitude of benefits:

  • Better Drainage: Aeration reduces water pooling by allowing water to penetrate deeper into the soil./li>
  • Improved Root Development: With the soil loosened, roots can spread more freely, leading to healthier grass.
  • Enhanced Nutrient Uptake: Healthy soil translates to better absorption of fertilisers and nutrients.

You might notice signs that indicate your lawn could use some aeration, such as compacted soil, thinning grass, or areas where water collects on the surface.

When is the Best Time to Aerate Your Lawn?

The ideal times for aerating your lawn are in the spring or fall. This seasonal timing aligns with your lawn’s growth cycle and gives the grass time to recover. To determine the best time, consider your climate and local conditions; in cooler areas, fall aeration is often more beneficial, while warmer regions may find spring to be the optimal time.

How Often Should You Aerate Your Lawn?

Aeration frequency largely depends on your soil type and how much traffic your lawn sees. Generally, lawns benefit from aeration once a year, but heavily trafficked areas may need more frequent attention.

How to Aerate Your Lawn: Step-by-Step Guide

Assess Your Lawn

Before aerating, evaluate whether your lawn truly needs it. Check for soil compaction and signs of stress in your grass.

Choose the Right Aeration Tool

There are different types of aerators to choose from:

  • Core Aerators: These remove plugs of soil and are generally more effective.
  • Spike Aerators: These simply poke holes in the ground but don’t remove any soil.

You can select between manual and powered versions based on your lawn size and budget.

Prepare the Lawn for Aeration

To prepare your lawn, mow it down to a shorter height and water it a day before aeration. Clearing away debris will help ensure the aerator works effectively.

How to Aerate a Lawn Yourself

Using a Mechanical Aerator

  • Rent the Aerator: Find a local equipment rental service and rent a mechanical aerator.
  • Aerate Your Lawn: Follow its operation guide, ensuring that you cover all areas and make overlapping passes.
  • Cost Consideration: Renting typically costs around $30 to $50 per day, depending on the model.

Post-Aeration Lawn Care: After aerating, consider applying fertiliser, top dressing your lawn or over-seeding to boost recovery and health. Ensure you water your lawn adequately afterwards to support new growth.

How to Aerate a Lawn by Hand

For smaller lawns or those on a budget, hand aeration is an excellent alternative.

Tools for Hand Aeration

  • Manual Core Aerator: This tool removes plugs of soil.
  • Sharp Garden Fork: Can be used to poke holes into the soil. Simply insert the fork and punch holes into the ground.

Common Mistakes to Avoid When Aerating

To get the best results from your aeration, be sure to:

  • Aerate at the right time of the year – avoid extremes of weather.
  • Water the lawn after aeration to help the soil settle and nutrients penetrate.
  • Use the right tools suited to your yard’s condition and size.

Conclusion

Aerating your lawn is a simple, yet crucial step in maintaining its health and vibrancy. By understanding when and how to aerate, along with choosing the best method for your specific lawn needs, you’ll be well on your way to achieving that lush, green lawn you desire. Happy gardening!

Always remember to reach out to our super friendly and helpful staff!! We are more than happy to guide you in the right direction to aerating your lawn!

How to Get Rid of Clover in Lawn

Posted on by Rachel Southin

Clover is a very common lawn weed, it isn’t one of the nastiest of weeds to deal with but can affect your lawn health and is usually a great indicator that your lawn is lacking in nutrients. Clover is a very opportunistic weed.

Clover is a sign that your lawn is underfed, overwatered or has been mown too short. All of these issues can be sorted easily by practising proper lawn care.

Clover in Lawn

Types of Clover

  • White clover – most common of all lover types. It has white to pink florets.
  • Red clover – this is taller and bushier than the white clover, it has reddish in colour florets.
  • Strawberry clover – appearance is extremely similar to white clover, but has smaller pink florets.

Understanding Clover in Lawn

Clover is a legume plant, much like Lucerne, alfalfa or beans. They draw nitrogen from the air and store it within it’s roots. Clover favours unhealhy, poorly fertilised lawns, so spotting clover may be an indication of a health issues with your lawn.

We always say “a healthy lawn will combat any weeds”.

In some cases, clover can be intentionally added to lawns to assist with drought. Some lawn lovers choose to live with a scattering of clover in their lawn, and depending on your grass type, the two may co-exist without being too much of an issue.

Preparing to Remove Clover

The easiest way to get rid of clover, is to look at your fertilisers and it’s nitrogen levels and look at using a higher nitrogen fertiliser to effectively deal with the clover. Our lawns all love nitrogen, while clover hates it. A good quality fertiliser like Lawn Solutions Premium Lawn Fertiliser is a must!

Otherwise, a thorough spray treatment will kill off the clover roots and the nitrogen will be replenished back into the soil. The following broadleaf herbicides are great for this, however be sure to read labelled rates and ensure the product you are purchasing is safe to use on your type of grass.

How to Get Rid of Clover in Lawn Naturally

Removing clover naturally means choosing the most environmentally friendly solutions to create a healthy lawn.

Effective natural clover control techniques:

  • Nitrogen-rich Fertiliser
  • Manual Removal – of only in small patches, ensure to remove all roots or the clover will return.
  • Corn Gluten Meal – Spread 1.0kg of corn gluten per 10m2, then water well. Let the corn gluten dry naturally.
  • Vinegar and Dish Soap – Add a few drops of dish soap to vinegar in a spray bottle, use that to spot treat the clumps of clover.
  • High Mowing – Clover grows low to the ground, keeping your mowing height a little higher will help block the sunlight from reaching the clover.
  • Organic Weed Killer
  • Smothering – For small isolated patches of clover, stretching a rubbish bag or similar over the patch and securing the corners can help smother the weed.

Prevent Clover Growth in Lawn

A healthy lawn will combat any weeds! Keep your lawn regularly maintained and have a fertiliser program in place! This will ensure your lawn remains healthy all year round and you beat the invasion of weeds.

  1. Pre-emergent herbicides like Oxafert can help prevent any weeds from germinating. This product is a must in a good fertiliser program.
  2. Proper mowing techniques
  3. Adequate watering practices
  4. Fertilising your lawn when required
  5. Keeping your soil compaction at a minimum, yearly spring renovations are great for soil health when preforming aeration techniques. Compacted soil can lead to clover weeds in your lawn.

Chemical Clover Control Options

The following broadleaf herbicides are great for this, however be sure to read labelled rates and ensure the product you are purchasing is safe to use on your type of grass.

Frequently Asked Questions

1. Is clover beneficial for my lawn in any way?

In some cases, clover can be intentionally added to lawns to assist with drought. Some lawn lovers choose to live with a scattering of clover in their lawn, and depending on your grass type, the two may co-exist without being too much of an issue.

2. Can natural methods be as effective as chemical herbicides for clover?

Yes and no, the simplest and easiest way to remove clover is to keep your lawn fed and healthy! Keep up regular lawn maintenance.

3. What are the most stubborn types of clover and how to prevent clover?

The easiest way to kill clover, is to look at your fertilisers and it’s nitrogen levels and look at using a higher nitrogen fertiliser to effectivley deal with the clover. Our lawns all love nitrogen, while clover hates it. A good quality fertiliser like Lawn Solutions Premium Lawn Fertiliser is a must!

Conclusion

Overall, the key to keeping your lawn free of weeds especially clover is to practice proper lawn care. Keep you lawn fed, watered and maintaned regularly. Clover plants are an opportunistic weed and will invade when the nitrogen levels in your lawn are low. Keep your lawn healthy!

How to Get Rid of Weeds in Lawn

Posted on by Rachel Southin

A healthy lawn will always combat weeds! It is extremely important to note that, regular maintenance is key to maintaining a weed free lawn. This includes regular mowing, watering and fertilising to promote healthy growth and crowd out any weeds!

Understanding Lawn Weeds

Heres a few common weeds you may have heard of or even have found in your lawn:

  • Clover
  • Creeping Oxalis
  • Crowsfoot/Grabgrass
  • Nutgrass or Mullumbimby Couch
  • Bindii
  • Winter Grass
  • Cudweed
  • Soursob
  • Onion Weed
  • Summer Grass
  • Paspalum

Weeds are invasive and are the bane of all lawn owners! Weeds will compete with your lawn for essential resources such as oxygen, water and nutrients in the soil. Weeds will also result in the weakening of your lawn, making it more prone to other issues such as pest infestation, drought and disease.

Preparing to Remove Weeds

There are many different tools available on the market for removing weeds!

  • Weed Pulling Tools
  • Cultivators
  • Shovels
  • Garden Tool Sets
  • Weeders
  • Organic Weed Killers
  • Weed Killers

Always ensure when using weed killers that you follow the label rates and instructions and wear the appropriate safety wear as recommended on the bottles.

How to Get Rid of Weeds Before Laying Turf

It is very important to ensure you remove all weeds or previous grass types prior to installing your brand new lawn! If you do not do so, these weeds and other grass types will make their way through your new lawn.

Step-by-step guide to weed removal prior to laying new turf:

  1. Clear the area of plants, grasses and any other unwanted weed growth. Pay particular attention to Kikuyu and Couch varieties as these are extremely invasive and may require more than one total kill application. Clearing the area is best done by spraying with a total kill, such as Roundup or Zero (Glyphosate). These needs to be complete a minimum of ten to fourteen days prior to laying your new lawn.
  2. Cultivate or Rotary Hoe dead matter into the existing soil base or export/remove the dead matter off site.
  3. Add in a turf underlay product to make sure you have the best base for your new lawn. We recommend 100mm as a good growing medium for a new lawn. Always be sure to double-check your pH levels to ensure it is still within the appropriate range of 5.5 to 7.

If you’d like to read more about proper soil preparation – read our blog on How to Prepare Soil for Turf.

How to Get Rid of Weeds in Lawn Naturally

There are benefits to controlling weeds in your lawn naturally. It helps keep your soil free from chemicals which in the long term is better for us, our families, our food and our planet.

Effective natural weed control techniques:

  • Boiling water method
  • Vinegar method
  • Mulching gardens to suffocate weeds
  • Removing weeds by hand

Preventing Weed Growth in Lawn

Keep your lawn healthy!

The obvious but not always easy solution to preventing weeds in your lawn is to keep your lawn healthy. A healthy lawn will combat any weeds due to it’s strong, deep and thick root system and dense growth that makes it hard for weeds to grow through.

  • Use a fertiliser such as Lawn Solutions Premium Fertiliser. To find out more about when and how often to fertiliser read out latest blog How Often Should You Fertiliser Your Lawn.
  • Protect with pre-emergents such as Lawn Solutions Oxafert. Pre-emergents are the best tool for preventing weeds emerging in your lawn. They will stop weed seedling from germinating in the soil.
  • Be vigilant and treat weeds as soon as they appear in your lawn. One year’s seeds is seven year’s weeds! Pull any weeds that pop up in your lawn before they have a chance to go to seed. Once gone to seed, this is when they become particularly stubborn to eradicate.
  • Mow regularly, some weeds can be suppressed with regular mowing.
  • Keep your lawn healthy with a regular watering routine. For an established lawn, our recommendation is to water deeply once per week. Preferably in the morning, otherwise in the afternoons when the temperatures are ideal.

Chemical Weed Control Options

Selective herbicides are able to selectively treat broadleaf weeds or grassy weeds, depending on the chemical without harming your lawn, however non-selective herbicides like glyphosate will kill any plant they come into contact with.

Always make sure to identify what weed you have and what your grass type is to ensure you don’t accidentally kill your lawn! If you are unsure, please email photos through to us at info@allturfsolutions.com.au where we are able to help identify and recommend what product you can use to treat.

Be sure to always follow labelled rates and ensure you wear the appropriate safety wear as recommended on the products labels. Safety comes first!

Frequently Asked Questions

1. How long should I wait to lay turf after applying weed killer?

Needs to be completed a minimum of ten to fourteen days prior to laying your new lawn.

2. Can natural methods be as effective as chemical herbicides?

Yes and no, the natural way can be labourous, especially if removing weeds by hand. But you do have the benefits of keeping your soils free from chemicals.

3. What are the most stubborn lawn weeds and how to deal with them?

Some of the most invasive and stubborn weeds include Nutgrass, Mullimimby Couch and Creeping Oxalis. Nutgrass and Mullimimby Couch can be treated with products like Lawn Solutions Sedge Control whilst Creeping Oxalis can be treated with products like Bow & Arrow which is safe to use on Buffalo and Couch lawns.

Conclusion

The obvious but not always easy solution to preventing weeds in your lawn is to keep your lawn healthy. A healthy lawn will combat any weeds due to it’s strong, deep and thick root system and dense growth that makes it hard for weeds to grow through.

Always pick the best method that suits your lawn and your needs! If you prefer to hand remove weeds rather than applying chemical than have at it!! You will reap the benefits of a chemical free environment!

Remember – one year’s seeds, seven year’s weeds.