Aerating your lawn once a year is incredibly beneficial in the south, where the temperatures can get unbelievably high. As temperatures begin to increase, you need to be sure your warm-season grass will have all of the needed nutrients throughout the year. (Autumn is the better time to aerate your cool-season grass.) The only way to do this is aeration.

Aeration is the process of poking large enough holes in your grass to improve the quality that water and nutrients pass through, into the soil. Aeration is necessary for proper growth and complete health of your yard while building a strong foundation for the entirety of it.

Your grass begins to grow at the very beginning of spring, therefore you want to aerate before it hits the peak of its growth. You also want to aerate before the warmer temperatures hit because if not, it is hard for the nutrients to travel deep enough to make a difference in the growth. Aeration allows your lawn time to fill in all of the holes you punctured earlier in the season.

Encouraging deeper roots, aeration is essential to keep your yard green and healthy year-round. How often should I aerate? It all depends on how hard your soil is. You can get an idea by doing this: Wait five days after a rain and try to poke a Phillips head screwdriver into the soil. If it only penetrates easily an inch, it’s time to aerate. A lot of folks aerate once each year and say it does their lawn a great deal of good.