You may be tempted to think that grass is grass, but nothing could be further from the truth.  If you are keen to take good care of your clients’ lawns so they can enjoy a luscious green lawn all year round, it pays to find out what a few basic terms mean.  One of these is thatch.

What is thatch?  Well, it’s not good.  And if a client has thatch they have a badly kept lawn, I’m afraid.  That’s just the way it is.

With that said however you can do a lot to make sure you get rid of any thatch you see.  You can also prevent further instances of thatch occurring, so keep reading for some useful tips on doing both of the above.

Firstly we should find out what thatch is, because this will help you to prevent it in future.  Basically it consists of debris and blades of grass that is left on the lawn.  For example if you mow it and don’t clear up all the grass clippings as you should, the items that remain will eventually form thatch.  Basically we’re talking about all the bad bits that have no place sitting on a lawn – so what you have to do is learn to remove them.

They are more likely if you don’t adhere to good lawn keeping methods.  For example if you aerate a lawn properly and regularly you will probably find you have less of a problem with the build up of thatch.  But if you don’t do this and you don’t clear up after yourself when you mow the grass, you will almost certainly end up with a build up of the stuff.  The same goes for not cutting the grass frequently.  If you keep it nice and short you will find that thatch is harder to take hold.  If you have long grass to tackle, don’t be too surprised to find thatch when you mow it.

As always with lawns, regular care can solve all these problems.  Dethatching is an activity you will need to become familiar with if you want every lawn you mow to start looking good again.  The good news is that the process isn’t too hard and you probably already have what you need to dethatch it quite easily yourself.

The piece of garden equipment you need is – drum roll please – a rake.  Yes, that is all you need.  The act of raking over a lawn (ideally once you have cut it) will get rid of all the thatch and dead material that is lurking within the good grass.  If you do this regularly you will find it solves the thatch problem once and for all.  Provided you keep it up you will keep this scourge at bay and never really be troubled by it again.

It might seem hard to believe that it can be solved by aerating the lawn and dragging a rake over it on a regular basis.  But that’s all there is to getting rid of this menace and moving towards a better lawn as a result.

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