Leveling a bermuda sodded yard

Meatdawg – posted 22 August 2005 23:36

I live in the Atlanta are and have red georgia clay as our main lawn soil. The yard is about a year old but riding on it with my rider it is very bumpy. It also has gashes and uneven spots throughout my yard after I cut it. I don’t like the way the yard looks. It looks like it was butchered. I was told to sand the whole yard and it would even it out. Is this so? Someone please help! Thanks,Steve in Atlanta

QWERTY – posted 23 August 2005 09:01

I have the same problem. That’s why I much prefer St Augustine so I don’t have to cut that low and risk scalping them. I don’t know about sand. They tend to dry out fast and you’d have to water more often. They are better suited for golf course which are loaded with sand. Try mixing sand and your native soil. It might work better???

Alex_in_FL – posted 24 August 2005 22:02

Sanding will go a long way towards leveling the yard. They do that to golf greens to keep smooth. You may need to do it more than once depending upon how unlevel the lawn is.

You might also try mowing slower – that used to help back when I used a riding mower.

budz – posted 05 September 2005 17:46

I tried leveling my yard and finally broke down and purchased a reel mower at peatree mowers on buford hwy. good luck, the yard is looking great now no more crop circles, lol

rballow – posted 14 September 2005 16:05

If the bumps arent that terrible try this trick, but be prepared to aerate soon after. After a good rain or letting the sprinklers run for a while until the ground is nice and wet, not too soggy though (kind of squishy, its more feel than anything, to the point that if you step on it and you shoe gets muddy its too wet), get a sod roller. You can usually pick one up at the hardware store for about 20 bucks a day. fill it up about half way or a little less (youll want to do this before you get the lawn nice and wet) when the lawn is wet, run the sod roller vertically one time and then horizontally trying to be as perfectly straight with each pass and making sure you try to stay 90 degrees to your first passes. Now it should be pretty darn flat, but you will compact the soil a bit so its a good idea, even in general, to rent an aerator (core not spike) to get rid of that compaction and improve the nutrient, air, and water flow in the soil as it is.