[alpine0000]

I'm in the transition zone. I aerate and seed the first week of September every year. I always think about adding in an aeration in the spring too, right before my pre-emergent goes down, but obv wouldn't wanna seed with the pre-emergent in the spring. What do you think? Any benefit to aerating twice a year instead of just once? I know rolling your lawn isn't the best thing for it because it compacts the soil, but I feel the need to roll it every year after winter because the freezing and thawing leaves heaving areas and I'm anal about trying to keep it flat, so I feel like after I roll it in the spring, it may be good to aerate and then spray my pre-emergent.

How about you guys with cool season lawns? Once a year? Twice a year? More?

 

[Virginiagal]

Zero

 

[pennstater2005]

Never aerated before. I did just use a thatch rake that noted on the label it was for dethatching and aeration so I guess maybe I did.

I'm not against aeration. I've had neighbors use lawn services who aerate then overseed. They also spray pre emergent and then blankets of what smells like 2,4D. Their lawns don't look terrible.

 

[social port]

Tons of folks aerate and highly recommend it, especially for soil that is predominantly clay. If I aerated, I would elect core aeration.
But I've decided not to aerate. I looked into 'chemical aeration' as an alternative and found it appealing. I'm not claiming that it is a full substitution. Chemical aeration does seem, however, to be far less aggressive for soil and it does not bring the underlying weed seeds to the surface. Both of these are noted problems of core aeration.

 

[j4c11]

About 0.3 times/year, on average.

 

[monty]

I have aerated once a year the last 3 years with great success. Moving forward I plan to try the Sodium Lauryl Sulfate for a few years and see how that works with maintaining.

 

[wardconnor]

I wish I owned a greens aerator. I'd use it a bunch.

 

[g-man]

My opinion is: if your soil organic matter is low and tce is high, then aereation will help break the soil layers and incorporate organic matter. Otherwise there is no point in doing it.

Wish there was more research into the topic, but I haven't found much.

 

[Fronta1]

Buy a couple hundred pounds of earthworms and dump them on your lawn. Your soil will be like moist chocolate cake in no time.

 

[Ridgerunner]

For me, that would depend on what I'm trying to accomplish and whether or not aeration is going to assist in achieving that goal. I'm not much of a proponent of preemptive strikes without substantial justification or applying substantial time, cost and effort without a "decent" pay-off. In the past, I've employed aeration as often as 3X a year, but I haven't done it again to any significant extent for the last 4.
Hope that doesn't come off sounding like Professor I. Corey.

 

[stotea]

Wish there was more research into the topic, but I haven't found much.

I 100% agree. And not just regarding aeration but all aspects of turf and soil management. Sure, some does exist, but pretty much everything I've found is several years or even decades old. Plus, there's rarely a summary that is concise and easy to understand.

Anyway, the empirical data I have found related to aeration was for sand-based putting greens. The general summary was that it sometimes made a positive difference on paper, but it was basically immaterial.