Decorative garden: Use lawn rollers correctly
These tips will help you find the right lawn roller for your garden
and use it correctly - whether for new lawn sowing or for levelling existing lawns.
Freshly laid turf is worked once again with the lawn roller to bond it firmly to the ground
turf rollers are basically nothing more than round drums with a long handle.
But no matter how massive they appear, the drums are hollow inside.
Lawn rollers get their weight from being filled with water or sand if they are to be particularly heavy.
If a lawn roller were really massive, it would not be possible to transport it, let alone bring it into the cellar.
At a glance: Use lawn rollers
Lawn rollers are suitable not only for sowing lawns,
but also for laying turf rolls and levelling the softened, uneven lawn in spring.
Make sure that you have sufficient weight and a soil scraper when you buy.
If the soil is loose, it is better not to pull it, but to push it slowly and layer by layer.
Clean the lawn roller after each use and apply some spray oil to the hub of the roller from time to time.
What are lawn rollers used for?
The tasks of lawn rollers are manageable.
That is why many garden owners do not buy it and prefer to borrow the machine when needed,
who they want to roll their lawn. Nevertheless, a garden roller is exactly the right tool for some jobs.
Lawn and turf
The roller is suitable for laying rolled turf,
because it allows you to press the turf perfectly into the loose soil prepared with humus and fertilizer.
With a new sowing of lawn also nothing goes without garden roller:
After digging, the soil is so loose that you sink into it immediately - this is not possible with lawns.
Only the lawn roller makes the soil tread-resistant.
After sowing, the roller presses the lawn seed into the soil,
so that the grains can close the ground from all sides and absorb water well.
A layer of potting soil on the seeds prevents heavy rain from washing
the seeds away or hungry birds from attacking the seeds.
Lawn seeds are best worked into the ground with the lawn roller
Remove unevenness
In spring, the lawn is often a hilly affair: the frost can literally lift the sods,
so that they often have little contact with the ground and
voles pass through the area with their corridors running closely below the surface.
These are clearly recognizable by the bulge.
This is a definite job for lawn rollers, which in the same operation press
the sods back on and flatten the corridors of mice, so that an even lawn surface is created again.
Mouse passes are of course also available in summer or fall,
so that the lawn roller can be used a second time.
However, the mounds of the mole are a size too big for
the lawn roller - the soil is not levelled and you have no choice
but to remove the mounds with a shovel or spread the soil with a rake.
Note:
Lawn rollers are not suitable for compacting soil or gravel under foundations.
This can only be done with vibratory plates or - for sportsmen - also with special hand tampers.
Pattern for the lawn
Soccer stadium in XXS:
With light lawn rollers you can create stripes and other patterns in your lawn after mowing.
The roller presses the blades in one direction so that you can alternately see the top and bottom of the grass.
There are also large models of lawn rollers, which you can then pull behind a lawn tractor.
How do you use a lawn roller correctly?
Lawn rollers are rather clumsy flatteners,
but you should still push them slowly and web by web - not wildly and criss-crossed.
Either you push the garden roller web by web and then work across the surface again in the cross direction,
or you guide the garden roller across the lawn in increasingly narrow circular paths.
Take generous curves, otherwise the edges of the lawn roller will press into the turf and compress it far too well at that point.
Push the lawn roller in front of you when the ground is loose and open, even though pulling is usually easier.
This is the only way you can walk on the compacted soil right away.
Otherwise there will be footprints in the ground and the lawn will be bumpy from the start.
For rolled lawns or for compacting existing lawns in spring, you can push or pull the lawn roller behind you.
Even if it needs more power: A lawn roller should be pushed and not pulled behind you
Remember that the soil should always be slightly moist when working with lawn rollers.
Otherwise clay is as hard as concrete and even rollers weighing several tons would not do anything.
Loose sandy soil would simply escape the lawn roller to the right and left, so that only a small part would be compacted.
What should you pay attention to when buying?
Lawn rollers for the hobby garden are hand tools for pushing or pulling.
They are made of metal or robust plastic and differ in width and possible weight.
Large roller models weigh a good 70 kilograms with water filling and 120 kilograms with sand.
Sounds like a lot, but it's absolutely necessary for a stable ground.
Wide lawn rollers save work on larger areas.
Narrow rollers exert more pressure on the ground for the same weight and are ideal for laying paths between vegetable beds.
When purchasing a lawn roller, make sure that it can be filled and emptied as easily and quickly as possible.
The diameter of the drum should also not be too small - 35, even better 40 centimeters - otherwise
the roller can get stuck in freshly dug up (sand) soil.
Important: The handle must have a good grip and be firmly screwed to the lawn roller - after all,
it must be able to withstand a lot and you must be able to push the roller safely at all times.
When buying a lawn roller, don't save on weight either.
A device that is too light does not help at all.
If you want the roller to be lighter for certain tasks,
it is better to drain some water or fill the drum only halfway.
If you buy a roller that is too light from the beginning,
you will be constantly annoyed later on when the rolled earth is still not treadable
and you somehow have to weigh the roller down with stones in an adventurous way.
The lawn roller should also have a soil scraper,
otherwise a mixture of soil, seeds or pieces of grass will stick to the drum quite quickly.
Once the lawn roller has an earth crust, it becomes unwieldy. It no longer levels evenly and works uncleanly.
How do you care for and maintain a lawn roller?
With a little care, lawn rollers will last for decades:
do not store the roller with water filling, but empty it after use. In the long run,
metal rollers can otherwise rust from the inside.
With sand, this is not so problematic if the weight of the roller does not interfere with the storage.
If the screw cap of the roller has a rubber seal,
you should grease it from time to time with Vaseline or with a rubber care stick known from car care.
After each use, you should clean the roller and either sweep off any adhering soil or spray it with a garden hose.
Before you then take the roller to the shed, it should be dry.
Every now and then a little spray oil on the hub of the roller makes it roll nice
and smoothly and you will have to make less effort when pushing it.
Avoid pushing your lawn roller for long distances over paved areas or gravel,
this will damage the paintwork and the surface.
A few scratches will not make it unusable, but the soil will adhere much
better to the scratches and make it harder to push the roller.
High-quality rollers and models for lawn tractors often have removable
or folding up transport wheels, which you should also use for this purpose.
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