Too early to Scarify your Lawn?

We are noticing a lot of traffic generated on this lawn advice blog site about scarifying your lawn.  Is it too early to perform this important mechnical task?

The quick answer is do not attempt to scarify the lawn until you have given the lawn its first or ideally second mow of the season and you have applied Soluble Iron to control the Winter Moss.

At such time, your lawn must be able to put on some natural recovery growth so performing this important mechanical lawn task too early in the year is complete madness and not very good for your lawn either.

We have had a bit of a late Spring and the lawns are just about getting their Spring rush of growth as temperatures rise.  The clocks going forward an hour is usually a good guide as to when to start scarifying your lawn.

There are still some lawn treatment companies who insist on scarifying a lawn in the winter and early spring months when there is no growth potential to aid recovery. Their actions and advice is totally wrong and goes against sound principles of turf culture so do not be hoodwinked into having it performed too early in the year.  Aeration is good though so long as the ground is firm enough to withstand the equipment and not make a mess of the surface.