When it comes to instant gratification, few outdoor projects can match a day spent laying sod. The task requires no previous experience, no complicated equipment or techniques and only a moderate level of planning and thought, but it results in an expanse of gorgeous new lawn.
If only more things in life paid off so well and so quickly on such a small investment of time, life would be much more pleasant.
Laying sod is a simple process of preparing the soil, unrolling strips of sod onto the ground until the surface is fully covered, watering it, and then standing back to enjoy your instant lawn. It can be back-breaking work, depending on the size of the area to be sodded and the number of people tackling the job together, and it is far more expensive than starting a new lawn from seed. But the advantage is that with one day of hard work you get a lush green carpet that will be ready for kids to tumble on and adults to sunbathe on within a week.
Sod is also a quick and hassle-free option for patching damaged places in an established lawn because it covers up unsightly areas right away. The price of sod, which is about $1.15 to $1.25 a square yard for whole-lawn quantities, goes up to about $2 a square yard when purchased in small amounts for patch jobs.
Timing’s everything
Industry professionals say a homeowner’s only big concern when deciding to lay sod is that the project be timed properly. Although sod bought at a nursery center or sod farm is hardy enough to be chopped, dragged and rolled, it doesn’t stay that way for long if it dries out. That’s why the experts advise having the soil ready, the team in place, and the time uninterrupted when the sod is delivered so it can be installed and watered in as quickly as possible.
“The clock has been ticking for that sod since the minute it was rolled at the farm,” says Doug Fender, executive director of Turfgrass Producers International, a Rolling Meadows-based sod industry association. “In the spring and fall in the Chicago area, you can keep sod off the ground for about 72 hours, but part of that is taken up by getting the sod to the retailer.”
Fender notes that a roll of sod is a little bit like a mini compost heap: Because the carbon dioxide-producing blades are squeezed together inside the roll, it is generating heat that threatens the grass the entire time it’s rolled. Increased air temperatures speed the process. The grass won’t be damaged if it is unrolled and watered soon, he says.
First, determine how much sod you need. If it’s just a patch job, you can easily measure the number of square feet needed by measuring the length and width of each spot to be patched. For new lawns, measure length and width and multiply one number by the other to get square feet. Because sod is generally sold by the square yard, divide the total by nine-not by three-to convert square feet into square yards. Find out when the retailer can deliver, then plan to have all preliminary work on the bed finished by then.
Start by preparing the soil. Using a strong rake, scrape away any weeds, old grass and other debris from the soil surface. Then till the soil, turning it over several times to loosen it, enhancing drainage and air circulation in the soil. Power tillers, available for rent at most rental centers, make tilling a large area easy. Without a machine, simply use a shovel to turn over all the soil in the future lawn area to a depth of about four inches. Break up any dirt clods and remove all rocks or other surprises you find below the soil surface. Once tilled, whether mechanically or by hand, the entire soil surface should be raked smooth.
Next, fertilize. The reason for adding fertilizer to the soil rather than spreading it atop the grass later is that at this point the goal is to stimulate root growth, not to green up the grass, says George Brandt, secretary-treasurer of American Sod, the Palatine sod wholesaler his parents founded in 1962. Brandt suggests using any brand of fertilizer that has roughly equal numbers for the three main ingredients-nitrogen, phosphorus and potash.
The last step before installing the sod is to get your team in place. Although one roll of sod weighs less than 10 pounds, the effort of moving it into place and unrolling it adds up to some serious back work after a few dozen rolls. For that reason, and in order to get the sod down fast so it can be watered, Brandt recommends having one person for every 250 square yards (2,250 square feet) of ground to be covered with sod.
Fender has a good labor-saving tip to keep in mind when the sod truck arrives. Most deliveries will use a small forklift to remove the pallet of sod from the truck, he says. “Ask them to drop segments of your delivery off in different parts of the yard so you don’t have to carry it piece by piece from one central pile,” he says.
If an unexpected surprise stalls the installation, try to keep the sod in a shaded area and hose it down once a day, Fender says. Keep it damp, but not so wet that the soil runs off and leaves the roots exposed.
Putting the sod in place is the easiest part of the project. Starting from a straight edge, such as a patio or a sidewalk, simply unroll the strips of sod one at a time and lay them on the ground until it is completely covered, being careful to walk on it as little as possible during installation. Lay the pieces so that they butt right up to each other without overlapping. To make the sod fit curves or any spaces smaller than one roll, use any utility knife to cut the sod to fit the spot.
A few tricks of the trade that will make the new lawn look better from the very start:
– Lay the sod with its ends staggered as in a brick pattern to keep from creating channels that can carry water across and off the lawn. (You can’t avoid such channels on the long sides of the strips.)
– Don’t stretch a piece of sod to touch its neighbor. It will shrink back to its real length and leave a gap.
– Don’t put partial pieces at the end of a row. If you come to the end and find that the remaining space is short, move the last full-length piece down to the end and insert the shorter piece ahead of it.
Once the sod is down, water it well. If the entire area can be covered with one sprinkler, give it an hour. If not, Brandt suggests moving the sprinkler at 15-minute intervals until each patch of lawn has had a total of 60 minutes under the sprinkler.
Keep traffic completely off the new lawn for three days and keep it to a minimum for a week. At that time, tug lightly on a piece of sod. If it comes up easily, its roots have not yet made contact with the soil and the lawn needs more time alone. But if you tug a bit and the grass stays in place, it’s time for a picnic.
SPRING’S PERFECT TIME FOR LAWN CHORES
Here are some spring lawn care ideas from Jim Fizzell, a horticultural consultant in Park Ridge, and Ken Bilow, owner of Advantage Horticultural Services in Lake County.
– Set the lawn mower blade to about an inch and a half high-or roughly half the normal mowing height-to scalp off dead grass, expose the little green shoots of new grass, and clear off weed debris. Fizzell says this treatment will help the lawn green up faster.
– Re-seed small bare patches by scratching up the soil surface, dropping any commercial seed variety onto the soil, then raking the soil over it to a depth of about one-quarter inch. If you normally apply crabgrass preventers to your lawn, keep them off re-seeded sections until the new sprouts have filled the space.
– Core aerate your lawn or have a service do it for you. Core aeration, or pulling up hundreds of soil plugs about the size of a man’s pinkie finger, works wonders at rejuvenating a lawn without the use of chemicals, Bilow says. It reduces soil compaction, water runoff, and the tendency to develop thatch; increases the pace at which the grass spreads; and makes the lawn better able to take up fertilizer, he says. Leaving the extracted cores on the lawn also brings healthy below-ground microbes up to the surface, he says.
– Take a closeup photograph of any diseased spots to the local garden center for comparison to the photos there of lawn pests, fungi and other evils. Better yet, dig up a square foot of the trouble spot and take it along.
– Fertilize in early May. Both Fizzell and Bilow say the custom of fertilizing a lawn on Easter, Memorial Day, July 4 and Labor Day is too much. Fizzell says to watch the lawn carefully for uneven green that might show a feeding has worn off in some parts of the lawn, usually about eight weeks later, and then apply another round of fertilizer.
