If Your Lawn Seems Parched and Lifeless, All It Needs Is ‘Soil Aeration’ — and It’s Quite Simple

The garden soil becomes tough and hardy over time. One day, the gardener rolls a loaded wheelbarrow on the soil, pushing, pulling, and ramming the fertilizer into the soil. Another day, the soil has to bear aggressive thrusts from a rake. An entire coterie of garden tools participates in this stress-inducing activity, not to mention torrents of rain and spells of drought that either leave the soil waterlogged or too parched. Tamped down by these recurring assaults, the soil often loses its capacity to hold water and breathe properly. Writing for Den Garden, gardening expert Susette Horspool shared a method that can help revive the dying soil.

Soil aeration – The answer to soil compaction

Horspool has been working in water conservation for years. Her job involves supervising teams of surveyors who help homeowners identify ways they waste water. One of the practices she and her colleagues often suggest for water conservation is “soil aeration,” apart from releasing an army of earthworms in the garden bed, which are natural soil aerators.

What is ‘soil aeration’?

Aerate, according to Merriam Webster, is “to supply or impregnate the soil with air” or to “supply air for respiration” in simple words. Horspool defines ‘soil aeration’ as the practice of poking holes in the garden to loosen the top soil under the surface, so it can regain its ability to absorb and retain water. When it does, the water will be able to dribble down deeper, enticing the grass roots to stretch downwards while encouraging the plants to rise upwards.

Soil aeration liberates the pores in the soil that were stressed or tense by pressure and compaction. The practice involves poking holes evenly throughout the soil bed, so the surface water is used up or evaporates. Horspool notes that there are zillions of methods to aerate the soil and poke holes. Spiked shoes, to begin with.

Spiked shoes

One way is to employ golf-like shoes with long spikes to dig the holes. This is the “easiest” option, but also the “least efficient,” mainly because the holes dug from pointy spikes often cause the soil to become even more compacted than it was earlier, which, sort of, defeats the entire purpose.

Farmer’s fork

Using a fork to poke holes consumes a lot of time and energy, but it is way better than using spiked shoes. The trick is to stab the soil repeatedly with the fork, dig it back and forth into the soil bed, lift it, and decompact the soil around it. @houseplantjournal used a chopstick to loosen the soil.

Aeration machine

Probably the best and the most efficient method to dig holes, an aeration machine punches holes in the soil in a way that it makes room for the rest of the soil to spread, so it can absorb and hold more water. The machine works perfectly for the garden soil as well as the clay soil. The process involves pushing it into the soil and pulling it back and forth like a lawnmower for aeration.

How to tell if your soil needs aeration?

Soil expresses its need for aeration in many different ways, Horspool says. Water runoff, for instance, is one of the signs. Another sign is when you try to dig a hole for a new plant and the trowel doesn’t seem to penetrate deep inside the soil. Or when you dig a tool into the ground and find that the soil is as dry as a bone below half an inch. When grasses are weedy, sparse, or brownish, that also indicates that the soil is thirsty and needs water and air.

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