# Best method to pick up cores



## CLT49er (Jun 19, 2020)

What do you find to be the best way to pickup aeration cores? Suck up in mower? Shovel them up? Broom, blow? Is it easier to do it right away when they have moisture or do you wait a day to allow the sun to dry them out?

This will be the first time aerating a bermuda lawn. I am also leveling with 70/30 two days later.


----------



## avionics12 (Jul 2, 2018)

Earlier this year I did my first leveling and used a 70/30 mix. 1 day after the aeration I used my Honda HRX to "mulch" the cores. It turned out well for me with much less labor and gave a nice area for leveling.


----------



## ck42 (Sep 16, 2019)

avionics12 said:


> Earlier this year I did my first leveling and used a 70/30 mix. 1 day after the aeration I used my Honda HRX to "mulch" the cores. It turned out well for me with much less labor and gave a nice area for leveling.


In the two only core aeration's I've done on my new bermuda lawn, my Honda HRX didn't do much to the cores (Georgia red clay). I think they were just too heavy.
Following this thread because I'm about to have a leveling done which begins with a core aeration...and I DON'T want those cores sitting there in the sand (past experience has shown that it takes MANY MANY weeks for my cores to break down)


----------



## Tmank87 (Feb 13, 2019)

Let them dry, blow onto street/driveway and scoop/dispose.


----------



## The_iHenry (Apr 23, 2019)

I just used a snow shovel and made a bunch of small piles. Then came around with a trash can and scooped them up with the shovel.


----------



## Groundskeeper Willie (Feb 22, 2019)

I use a 3ft wide landscaping rake - the solid back edge of it, not the tines - to pull the cores into rows then sweep them up into a big dust pan, dumping that out into a wheelbarrow as the pan gets full. Starting on a corner of one side of the field, reach out into the cores, swinging and pulling the landscaping rake in a slight arc motion to roll the cores towards you. To avoid smushing the cores pull the rake lightly over the turf. The key is to get them rolling. Too much pressure can trap cores on the grass and smush them. Step forward and do it again. Begin creating a row of cores. When you have raked from one end of the row to the other you will have created a clear lane in the core-field. Now you step into that cleared out lane. Turn to face the opposite direction and then pull the same cores from the other direction to tighten up the row so they can be scooped/swept into the dust pan. Repeat the raking up process in parallel rows, making a clear lane, stepping into that lane and pulling from the other side, until all the cores are rolled up into tidy lines. Then scoop them up with the dustpan and broom. Hours of fun.

This may not be the best method to pick up cores, but it's great for killing time while you are in quarantine.


----------



## MasterMech (Sep 24, 2017)

CLT49er said:


> What do you find to be the best way to pickup aeration cores? Suck up in mower? Shovel them up? Broom, blow? Is it easier to do it right away when they have moisture or do you wait a day to allow the sun to dry them out?
> 
> This will be the first time aerating a bermuda lawn. I am also leveling with 70/30 two days later.


Couple options here.

Drag mat - You'll want to time this one right, and it will depend on your soil. In my red clay, I have a window of about 45 mins to 2 hrs after pulling cores (in bright sunshine) in which they crumble easily. The flexible steel drag mat will easily break them up at this point, leaving only the thatch and plant material on the surface. You can follow up with a rotary mower w/bagger, lawn vac, or lawn sweeper to clear the debris. Blowers, rakes, and manually bagging for collection are an option if you aren't doing a huge area.

Or, if you have a lawn sweeper, they work to pick them up. That's my usual route. I can get 90% of them up that way. I will then pick up the rest using a snow shovel, and then to really super-clean the yard, I run the verticutter (set at my HoC) over what's left with the basket on. When the pugs are very dry, they simply disintegrate on contact with the verticutter blades and the thatch plug gets tossed into the basket.






Snow shovels work wonders to collect and scoop cores on reel-mowed turf. The lower you cut, the better they work! The cheaper plastic ones with plastic edges are all you need. Kinda hard to find in the South during aeration season. :lol:


----------



## RDZed (Jul 13, 2018)

High lift blades.


----------



## CLT49er (Jun 19, 2020)

Love the ideas. Keep em coming. I think everyone has their own method. Havent heard about high lift blades til now. Interesting. Snow shovel might be my method. It doesnt get much use in NC. Although it does cleanup kids toys on the carpet quick! &#128521;


----------



## Mister Bill (Apr 12, 2019)

RDZed said:


> High lift blades.


I had a commercial Hi-Vac Snapper with the high lift kit installed. That mower would suck sand out of concrete.


----------



## RDZed (Jul 13, 2018)

Mister Bill said:


> RDZed said:
> 
> 
> > High lift blades.
> ...


Seriously.

An old dull set of High Lift Blades and set your mower one notch higher than the finished cut height and those cores will be gone in one pass.


----------



## VALawnNoob (Jun 9, 2020)

can i use the sun joe dethatcher (tines option - not scarifier) to scoop into bag?


----------



## Lawn Whisperer (Feb 15, 2021)

Has anyone used a lawn vacuum to pick up cores?
https://www.sunbeltrentals.com/equipment/detail/1164/0700003/lawn-vac/


----------



## Mathwiz (Jul 20, 2021)

Another vote for the lawn sweeper behind a riding mower. Works excellent and fast.


----------



## Lawn Whisperer (Feb 15, 2021)

Mathwiz said:


> Another vote for the lawn sweeper behind a riding mower. Works excellent and fast.


Will it work with taller HOC?


----------



## feinhorn (May 3, 2021)

For Bermuda that is already HOC ~ 1" , I used my rotary at the lowest setting and ran over them a bunch. It worked really well for me. I started bagging, it was not worth it so I went bagless.


----------



## Boy_meets_lawn (Sep 27, 2020)

Lawn Whisperer said:


> Has anyone used a lawn vacuum to pick up cores?
> https://www.sunbeltrentals.com/equipment/detail/1164/0700003/lawn-vac/


So I bought a used billy goat vac with the intention of collecting cores. It ended up being easier to just use a backpack blower and blow them into piles.

The yard vacuum is really good around the yard for many things but removing cores isn't one.


----------



## Mathwiz (Jul 20, 2021)

Lawn Whisperer said:


> Mathwiz said:
> 
> 
> > Another vote for the lawn sweeper behind a riding mower. Works excellent and fast.
> ...


Good question and I'm not so sure. I used one after a scalping to 1" and it worked great.


----------

