The summer is halfway over. Soon kids will be heading back to high school and college. And that gets us thinking about grades.
Like with students, grading matters to the future of your home’s landscape. But there will be no tests, pluses, minuses, or extra credit.
For your property, grading refers to changing the slope or elevation of land by filling in holes or creating them. You may sometimes complete grading by hand for small depressions or bumps, but it pays to use professional equipment on expansive properties.
So why bother grading your land? Several advantages to grading will make your property safer, more efficient, and more enjoyable to spend time in. Here are Custom Acre’s top 9 reasons to grade your landscape!
Making Your Mowing Easier
Ever tried to mow a vertical wall. Please say no. While it’s unlikely you’ve ever attempted to cut a 90-degree slope, you have likely trimmed varying degrees of steepness.
The steeper a property is, the more difficult it is to mow. Likewise, the more difficult it is to cut, the longer it will take to mow a property. Therefore grading your property saves you money and time during your regular maintenance.
You only have to grade once, but you probably mow once or twice every two weeks. That’s a lot of time to get back over a year.
Worse, if a slope is too steep, you risk tipping the mower, which brings us to our following reason.
Preventing Injuries
Grading your property helps to prevent injuries. As they say, safety comes first (except in this list where it technically comes second but is still the most important reason).
We’ve told you about the danger of mowing on a slope. Thousands of people are hospitalized for mowing-related injuries every year. But that’s only one way that grading your property makes it safer.
Simply taking a walk is safer with a leveled property. It’s easy to roll or sprain your ankle when you walk on a property with lots of little holes or uneven surfaces.
If for no other reason, you should level your property to make it safer.
Improving Drainage
We’ve espoused the dangers of poor drainage in our blog before. To summarize, drainage problems can cause plant death, exacerbate compacted soil, destroy your lawn and even flood your house.
One of the main ways that poor drainage occurs is improper grading. Water, like everything else, follows gravity. With water drawn to the lowest point, you want to grade your property so that your water is either evenly spread or draining to a place that is beneficial to you.
While there are drainage solutions for low-lying homes, starting with a well-graded property is always the easiest and most efficient.
Preventing Erosion
Poor grading combined with drainage problems can cause erosion to your property. For example, when you have gardens at the top of hills, you risk some of the soil from those gardens, and the plants themselves, flowing downhill with water.
Erosion can further exacerbate drainage issues, further aggravating your soil compaction. Compacted soil then can’t support plant life which then causes more erosion.
The way to stop this vicious cycle is to grade your landscape properly in the first place.
You Are Adding A Structure
It’s not just the organic features on your property that benefit from correct grading. A level yard is also essential for adding a structure.
When building a shed, garage, or even a second house on your property, you will need to start with a flat surface. While it’s not impossible to build a home into a hill, it takes a specialized skillset, and unless the slope is serving a function for your home, you will want to start with a flat, graded property.
Likewise, adding a driveway or even a walkway requires proper grading before construction. Hardscaping should be built in an already graded yard.
Improving Water and Irrigation
You’ve spent time beautifying your yard. You’ve planted your favorite trees and shrubs. You’ve installed gorgeous multi-layered flower beds.
Now you need to keep them all watered.
Watering is a lot easier to do on an adequately graded property. But, again, you don’t always want to be fighting gravity when taking care of your plants.
Our irrigation systems are perfect for getting your plants the water they need when they need it to thrive, but your irrigation system will be more effective with a level yard.
And better effectiveness means…
Saving Money
Now here’s our seventh reason. The six previous reasons are all factors we can work around through extra labor and supplies. But all of those additional labor hours and supplies cost money.
The fact is, everything is simpler when you’re not fighting gravity. When it’s easier, it takes less time and resources. So that means you pay less.
Between preventing injuries and saving money, do you even need any other reasons? Well, maybe the next one.
Improving Your Plant Health
Like saving money, most of the first listed reasons affect this. For example, plant health improves when erosion is prevented, plants are adequately watered, and drainage is corrected.
You’ve landscaped your yard because you love your trees, shrubs, and flowers. Help them get what they need; they will love you right back.
Anyone who’s spoken to a high school guidance counselor knows that your grades are matched only by standardized tests in importance when applying to college. So grading your property will affect its future.
Sorry. That’s just a silly grading joke.
So, does your property make the grade?
Do you have holes and bumps you’d like to even out in your yard? Are your plants getting watered unevenly or lost to erosion?
Custom Acres can help. Reach out for all of your grading and other landscaping needs. And let us know about your grading experiences or if we missed what you think is the most crucial reason to grade your property correctly!