Terrain Aeration

Decompaction of turf after winter snow and ice

Looking out of the window now, there is little by the way of a reminder that only a couple of months ago, most of the United Kingdom has been brought to a standstill by severe winter conditions: a blanket of deep snow and ice covered the countryside and as a result, public parks and sports pitches became unplayable.

Turf professionals, despite now having the sun on their backs, will still be working their magic on the rootzone to repair the ravages of the big freeze.

Most turf compaction problems are caused by man or beast walking or playing on the grass. However, sometimes there are other recreation activities that lead to severely compacted surfaces.

Kickstarting baked hard sports pitches after drought

We have seen a long period of dry weather with very little rain or moisture in the South and East of England which has meant that local authorities have been forced to cancel football matches following the late summer drought as the ground is too compact.

It will require only a modest level of sustained rainfall to render sports pitches unplayable. This is because the water cannot percolate down and reach the drainage system. Aeration is the solution - but penetration is not easily achieved by many ‘top surface’ machines.

Decompaction of sports turf and root-zones across Europe

We have the machinery and we will travel to most of mainland Europe to assist turf and tree care professionals with the aeration of compacted soil on sports surfaces, including rugby and football pitches, golf courses, tennis courts and bowling greens.

We can also treat the root-zone areas of fruit orchards and vineyards to a depth of one metre by injecting compressed air under high pressure to break up soil pans or to relieve poor drainage.

If you would like more details then please email us

Terrain Aeration in South Wales

We will be despatching a team into South Wales in the week beginning 4th May 2009.

If you have a need for our de-compaction service treating turf or tree roots with compressed air to a depth of one metre then please email us asap.

De-compacting a public football pitch

By fracturing the soil with compressed air, our main aim is to re-instate a 'two way street' by removing the 'road block' of compaction thus allowing water and nutrients to flow and at the same time allowing the essential air to circulate.

There are so many positives that come out of our rootzone treatments that it is difficult to name them all, or perhaps even put them into any kind of order of importance; I suppose it depends on the use of the ground we are treating and the objectives of the management team that have called us in to respond to their specific problem.

One of the greatest joys for Terrain Aeration is probably being able to ease a problem in community sports pitches, where local young people come to play and train, but are often curtailed because, due to a mixture of overuse, lack of money to do maintenance or poor historical rootzone structure, football or rugby is often called off when surfaces become unplayable.

Treating public parkland for soil compaction

Being a park manager is not an easy job at the best of times. Grass cutting and maintenance operations have to be carried out when park users are enjoying their surroundings.

Keeping the grass in tip top condition is always a challenge for grounds staff and with parks also getting a funding boost for restorations and improvements the facilities are seeing increased activity.

In August 2008, St James' Park in London held the Olympic handover ceremony concert. As a result the grass areas of the park were left with severe compaction caused by foot traffic, the stage area and vehicles used for delivering staging and outside broadcasting units.