Marysville spreads across flat ground north of Everett, out toward Tulalip. The lots are bigger than the city lots to the south, and the ground is slow to drain. Water does not run off a slope because there often is not a slope. Rolls laid on slick clay root into the seam and stop. The lawn looks perfect for a month and then browns in plates.
Snohomish County · ZIP 98270 · 2020 population 70,714
Sod on clay needs a base, not hope
We break the clay, add compost, and rake a bed the roots can enter. Low spots get filled or drained before a single roll comes off the truck. A pretty grade that holds a puddle is the wrong grade.
Seams are tight and staggered, and the edges against beds are cut, not left as flaps. You water enough that the sod does not shrink apart, and you stay off it. We come back if a seam opens because we laid it loose. We do not come back to replace sod that was used as a path on day three.
The ground in Marysville
Flat ground sounds easy until a winter storm sits on it. French drains and permeable surfaces matter here more than tall walls. Yards are family yards: room for a lawn, a play set, fruit trees that people already have and want kept, and a patio that can take a barbecue without turning into a pond.
The soil is the kind that grows a decent lawn if it can breathe, and moss if it cannot. We mow, aerate, and seed the open lawns, and we bark the beds so the weed cycle slows down. Drainage is the job we would rather do first. A new sod lawn laid over undrained flat clay is a replacement lawn in two years. Fruit trees get pruned for light and for the fruit, not sheared into balls.
How we do the work
Sod is instant cover and a slow root. It dies when it is laid on compacted clay, on a moss mat, or in a low spot that stays wet. We strip or till, we fix the grade so water leaves, and we lay tight seams on soil that has been loosened a few inches down.
The first two weeks are water and no traffic. After that we want roots chasing soil, which means less frequent watering. A sod lawn that is sprinkled every day forever is a sod lawn that peels up in August.
We lay what arrives that day. Sod that sits on the pallet through a warm afternoon cooks in the roll, and we will not install it.
What we look at first
- What is under the old lawn
- Grade and where the roof water goes
- Access for the pallets
- Sun, because sod in deep shade is an expensive way to grow moss
Seams and edges
Tight, staggered, no overlap. Edges tucked against beds so the mower does not scalpel a flap. We cut curves with a knife, not by stretching a roll around a corner until it tears.
The first two weeks
Water enough that you cannot peel a corner up by the end of week two. Stay off it. Mow the first time at three inches once it resists a tug. Then ease the water back so the roots leave the roll.
What is under the roll
A few inches of loosened soil and compost, graded to leave the house. Not the old lawn. Not landscape fabric. Not a sand bed that turns into a pan. If we cannot prep, we should not lay sod.
More from this crew
- Sod installation across Snohomish County
- Lawn seeding in Marysville
- Lawn aeration in Marysville
- Landscaping in Marysville
- Lawn fertilization in Marysville
- Sod installation in Everett
- Sod installation in Arlington
- Sod installation in Lake Stevens
Sources for the climate and the water
- USDA plant hardiness map for choosing plants that can take a Snohomish County winter.
- EPA WaterSense on watering less once a lawn or a new planting is established.
- EPA Soak Up the Rain on keeping roof and yard water from becoming someone else’s problem.
