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Janet · 20-02-2014, 06:48 PM posted to uk.rec.gardening

In article ,
says...
From: Spider
Newsgroups: uk.rec.gardening

On 20/02/2014 14:28, Janet wrote:

In message , Spider
writes
On 19/02/2014 13:02, David.WE.Roberts wrote:
The sun is shining, the birds are singing, the grass is growing.

Has the time come for the first cut?

I doubt the ground will be truly dry until the grass reaches waist height.

Cheers

Dave R

Before I do my first cut, I shall aerate the lawn first, to help it
drain more freely. Why not see if you can walk on yours and try
aerating it before mowing?

Haven't you followed weather reports?

Of course I have.

In the many areas where months of heavy rain have either raised local
water tables or saturated subsoil and topsoil, aerating the lawn will
make not a blind bit of difference. Just as pulling out the bathplug
won't solve a blocked drain.

Janet.

I was replying to David, who had sunny weather and a growing lawn.

He lives in Suffolk, which has been heavily flooded. Sunny weather at
this time of year has minimum evaporation effect so won't reduce the
water held in saturated soil. Nor will "aerating the lawn".

If
his lawn was too saturated to work (whether mowing or aerating), it
would probably be suffering from anaerobic topsoil/subsoil and not
growing well or at all.

Nonsense. Our grass is growing, the ground is completely saturated,
it is not suffering from anaerobic topsoil/subsoil. Just a very wet
winter.

If you had read my post, you would see that it implicitly suggested that
*if* he could walk on it, he *might* try aerating it. This would make
it less compacted and to some extent freer draining.

No, it will not make it freer-draining while the soil is saturated.

In turn, this
would cause less damage when he walks on it to mow it, *when* he mows it.

Walking (and working) on saturated lawn is going to cause more damage
not less.

I was offering David what I believed to be sound advice served with
caution. If you've got some genuinely good advice, then I suggest you
give it to David.

I did that by counteracting your dodgy advice and explaining why it
was faulty.

Janet.