How to Add Sand to Grass for Drainage

Help your grass fields drain faster by adding sand onto the soil.

Adding sand to your grass to aid in drainage is a project that requires care. You don’t want to smother the soil and prevent growth. As a preventative measure, the sand isn’t added alone. With a mix of peat, sand and loam, you can create a top dressing for the grass that enriches the soil as well as helps with drainage. The sand aids directly with drainage issues, preventing the soil from over absorbing and holding water, while the peat and loam breaks down over time, adding nutrients to your soil that will have your grass growing lush and full for years.

Things You'll Need

• Lime free sand
• Loam
• Peat
• Wheelbarrow
• Hoe
• 1/4-inch soil sieve
• 5-gallon bucket
• Spade
• Rake

Instructions

1. Combine your top dressing mix in a wheelbarrow using a hoe for stirring the mixture together. Use three parts sand, three parts loam and one part peat in the mix. Make sure all three ingredients are dry to ensure an even mixing of the parts.

2. Place a 1/4-inch soil sieve onto a 5-gallon bucket and push the mixture through to create a dressing fine enough to slide through the grass stems to the soil beneath.

3. Distribute the dressing over the grass using a spade. Spread the mix evenly over the grass, using about 3 pounds of mix for every square yard of grass covered.

4. Run the backside of a rake over the grass after dressing distribution in order to spread the mixture more evenly and to work the mix into the top of the soil.

5. Examine the grass for any signs of the dressing on top. Go over these areas a second time with the rake to push the dressing down to the soil.

Tips & Warnings

• Increase the sand by a part and lower the loam a part when dealing with clay soils. Reduce the sand a part and leave the other ingredients the same when dressing sandy soils.

References

• Danny Lipford; Top-Dressing to Improve the Soil in Your Lawn; Julie Day