Soil Compaction in the Landscape

One big goal of establishing a home lawn and landscape is to enjoy an attractive setting for family and friends, while also helping manage healthy soils and plants.  Soil compaction at these sites can cause multiple problems for quality plants establishment and growth.  Soil is an incredibly important resource creating the foundation for plants and water absorption.

Soils are composed of many different things, including minerals.  In Florida, these minerals often include sand of differing sizes and clay in the northern area of the counties in the panhandle of Florida. Soil is also composed of organic matter, nutrients, microorganisms and others.  When soil compacts, the air spaces between the sand or clay are compressed, reducing the space between the mineral particles.  This can occur anytime during the landscape and lawn construction phase or during long term maintenance of the area with equipment that could include tractors, mowers, and trucks.

What can be done to reduce soil compaction?  There are steps that can be taken to help reduce this serious situation.  Make a plan on how to best approach a given land area with the equipment needed to accomplish the landscape of your dreams.  Where should heavy equipment travel and how much impact they will have to the soils, trees, and other plants already existing and others to be planted?  At times heavy plywood may be needed to distribute the tire weight load over a larger area, reducing soil compaction by a tire directly on the soil.  Once the big equipment use is complete, look at ways to reduce the areas that were compacted.  Incorporating organic matter such as compost, pine bark, mulch, and others by tilling the soil and mixing it with the existing soil can help.  Anytime the soil provides improved air space, root will better grow and penetrate larger areas of the soil and plants will be healthier.

Even light foot traffic over the same area over and over will slowly compact soils.  Take a look at golf course at the end of cart paths or during a tournament with people walking over the same areas.  The grass is damaged from the leaves at the surface to the roots below.  Plugging these areas or possibly tilling and reestablishing these sites to reduce the compacted soils may be necessary.

Water absorption is another area to plan for, as heavy rains do occur in Florida.  Having landscapes and lawns that are properly managed allow increased water infiltration into the soil is critically important.  Water runoff from the site is reduced or at least slowed to allow the nutrient from fertilizers used for the plant to have more time to be absorbed into the soil and taken up by the plants.  This reduces the opportunity for nitrogen, phosphorus, and other nutrients to enter water areas such as ponds, creeks, lagoons, rivers and bays.  Even if you are miles from an open water source, movement of water runoff can enter ditches and work their way to these open water areas, ultimately impacting drinking water, wildlife, and unwanted aquatic plant growth.

Plan ahead and talk with experts that can help with developing a plan.  Contact your local Extension office for assistance!