Core Aeration

Enhance Your Lawn with Core Aeration

At Tompkins Lawn Care, we believe in going beneath the surface to ensure the health and vitality of your lawn. That’s where core aeration comes into play, an essential service that can prevent thatch accumulation and enrich your soil, resulting in a greener, lusher lawn.

What Is Thatch and Why Is It a Problem?

Thatch is a layer of dead grass, roots, and other organic matter that accumulates between the soil and the green vegetation of your lawn. While some thatch is natural and even beneficial, excessive thatch can lead to a host of problems. It impedes water penetration, making it difficult for your lawn to absorb the moisture it needs. Thatch also hinders the effectiveness of fertilizers and pesticides, preventing these essential treatments from reaching the soil and the grassroots. Left unchecked, it can choke your lawn’s growth and overall health.

The Core Aeration Solution

Core aeration is your lawn’s best friend in the fight against thatch accumulation. This process involves extracting small plugs or cores of soil from your lawn, creating openings in the thatch layer. These plugs of soil rest on the surface where soil organisms, such as microbes, can break it down. Over time, this transformation of thatch into beneficial organic material is essentially composting in your lawn. The resulting organic material enriches your soil and provides valuable nutrients that your grass can use for healthy growth.

The Right Timing for Core Aeration

Most lawns can benefit from annual core aeration. If you have a heavily used lawn or your grass is growing in heavy clay or subsoil conditions, you might want to consider aeration twice a year. For golf fairways, sports turf, and municipal properties subjected to extensive use, core aeration may be necessary three to five times per year, depending on the level of traffic.

Plan Ahead for a Seamless Service

At Tompkins Lawn Care, we want to ensure that your core aeration experience is smooth and trouble-free. To do that, it’s crucial that we have all the information we need to service your property effectively. If your lawn area contains underground wires, pipes, or fixtures buried less than 4 inches beneath the surface, please notify us in advance. This way, we can make the necessary arrangements and take note of any potential obstructions.

Core aeration is a standard part of our service program, typically conducted from early September through October and into November. However, additional planning and scheduling may be required if you have an irrigation system or an underground, wired pet containment system. These components must be flagged before we can provide core aeration service to avoid any disruption.

Irrigation systems, in particular, should be flagged before they are winterized. If you plan to have your irrigation system heads flagged in preparation for winterization, remember to order this service in advance. Once the lines are blown out for the season, it will be too late, and we won’t be able to perform the aeration service. To expedite the process, we recommend cutting the grass before flagging your system, giving us additional time to schedule and complete the work before your lawn needs its next trim. When your system is flagged, simply notify us, and we’ll be there promptly, typically before your grass requires cutting again.

With our core aeration service, your lawn will benefit from improved soil quality and a stronger, healthier foundation for lush growth. Contact us today to schedule your core aeration and take your lawn to the next level.