The Perfect Recipe: How Aeration & Overseeding Work Together

Have you seen the Disney/Pixar movie “Ratatouille”? It’s about a rat named Remy who becomes a gourmet chef. He does this because he has a greater appreciation of the nuances of food taste than the average rat or even the average person.

Anyway, there’s a scene in Ratatouille where Remy has a bite of an apple, which he enjoys, and then a bite of cheese which he also enjoys. But then Remy has them both together, and fireworks explode in his mind!

Long walk, but sometimes things go better together. And aeration and overseeding is the prime example of that.

Knowing Your Ingredients

If you’re not a landscaper, you might not know what aeration and overseeding are. Both aeration and overseeding are vital processes to lawn maintenance, but they’re not common household words the way that, say, mowing is.

But don’t worry! We are about to tell you anything you could ever want to know about both.

What Is Aeration? It’s Like Sifting Flour

Aeration is adding air, in the landscaping context, to the soil. By the look of the word, you are likely unsurprised. Aerating the earth is a process like sifting flour.

As with flour, aerating soil is about airing it out and making it lighter. But, unlike flour, the soil is not sitting in a bag you can then pour into a sifter. As such, the earthbound nature of the ground is a complicating factor.

For this reason, the soil is aerated by poking holes with special equipment. You may have seen people aerate the soil with cleated shoes. Unfortunately, this method is less than ideal for reasons we’ll soon explain.

What Is Overseeding? It’s Like Liberal Seasoning

Overseeding, like aeration, is a word whose definition you can infer. Overseeding involves adding seed over a lawn to help to keep it thick with new growing grass, filling in any bare spots. Overseeding should follow after aeration.

The Right Equipment

You wouldn’t try to cook a Thanksgiving turkey in a microwave or toaster. However, the right equipment is essential for doing the job right.

When aerating, professional equipment is needed – not just to poke holes in the ground but pull out clumps of earth called cores. The reason it’s essential is that simply poking holes can create a more compacted earth as the soil is forced down.

Likewise, some people may try to throw grass seeds where the lawn looks bare, but again, spreading seeds with a spreader will do the job more evenly and help to cover areas you might not know to notice by your eye alone.

Not Too Much

The aeration process also removes thatch, another word to add to your landscaping vocabulary. Thatch is plant matter that doesn’t break down and collects around grass roots.

A certain amount of thatch can help create resilience in your lawn. But too much thatch has much the same effect as compact soil. It chokes plant growth by blocking sunlight and water from getting to the grass.

Dethatching is another landscaping service you can consider if you have a severe thatch problem.

Hunger – Knowing What You Need

How can you tell your lawn needs aeration and overseeding? Well, it’s a regular part of lawn maintenance, and you could take our word for it, but if you are looking for signals that your lawn is asking for the one-two punch of aeration and overseeding, here’s what to notice:

Compacted soil is the first sign that aeration is needed. Since the purpose of aeration is “sifting” the soil, this should be no surprise. A more severe warning that your lawn requires aeration and overseeding is bare or brown spots in your grass.

Compacted soil causes lawn death because plants need space to grow and get water and nutrients. Plants cannot take in what they need when the soil is too dense.

The Recipe: Why Do They Go So Well Together?

Aeration would be the first step in the process if this were a recipe. When the soil is dense, Rish will use an aerator to help spread it out and make room for the plants’ growth.

Generally, this is something we do once a year. Popular times for aerating are generally the fall and the spring.

Now we’re cooking! After aeration, it’s time to overseed. It’s always best to overseed after aeration, which is why you will often see these two processes described and performed together.

The reason overseeding works so well after aeration is that the soil has been perfectly prepped for adding seeds. Seeds need water, fertilizer, sun, and air to grow. When we properly aerate the ground, it makes it much easier for all of these to reach the seeds.

Aeration has given the seeds the space they need to grow.

Timing Is Everything

We’ve already mentioned that typically, you aerate in the fall or spring. But because we like to do aeration and overseeding together, we perform both sequentially in the fall.

Fall planting is vital for overseeding grass because it allows the seeds to start during mild weather. However, spring can quickly become summer, so grass can get a little cooked, creating a lower grass yield.

For this reason, aeration and overseeding are best done together in autumn.

The Final Dish

Like cooking, aerating and overseeding must be done correctly to get the right final product. Rushing the process or doing something at the wrong time can ruin your lawn. Likewise, using the wrong tools or misusing the right tools will not get you the property you crave.

Contacting a professional landscaping company to handle your lawn care needs is always best. At Rish, we are like your trained personal chefs delivering you the delicious meal you ordered: in this case, a lush green lawn.

Rish offers detailed service with premium results. And we’ll know if your yard requires aeration and overseeding.

The season is coming up. Can you hear the dinner bell? Give us a call!