Any modern person, being the happy owner of a country house or a country house, sooner or later thinks about creating a beautiful lawn in the area in front of the house. Garden times, when every free piece of land was carefully planted with potatoes, tomatoes, peppers and cucumbers, gradually disappear - on the shelves of stores at any time of year you can buy any vegetable, even growing far from our latitudes.

The economic advantage of the garden is also doubtful - labor costs do not justify the final cost of the grown products. It also affects the influence of the West - remember, in any American film in front of the house is a beautiful green lawn, where children and animals frolic with pleasure. It is for the above reasons that people tend to have a beautiful, even lawn near their house or cottage.

In addition to the remarkable external characteristics, the lawn has a mass of useful properties, discussed below:

1. The even green color of the lawn has a favorable effect. relaxing effect on the nervous system, brings calm and spirituality.
2. Lawn great detains dust in huge volumes, not allowing it to rise into the air even when the wind is blowing and does not settle in the lungs of a person.
3. Along with all green areas, the lawn is in the process of photosynthesis produces oxygen with negative ions, allowing you to breathe deeply after a smoky metropolis.

However, to create a truly beautiful and reliable lawn is not easy, it will take a lot of effort, the presence of some special tools, and, of course, cash. In this article we will look at one of the main tools used to create a lawn - garden roller.

Content

• 1 Why do I need a garden roller?
• 2 What is a garden roller?
• 3 Make a garden roller with your own hands
• 4 General tips for using the roller

What is a garden roller for?

Already at the preliminary stage - lawn site preparation - you will need a skating rink. First of all, all garbage is carefully removed from the site, then the turf is removed - the upper fertile layer of soil. Next, a drainage layer is constructed of rubble and sand, which serves so that during heavy rains, excess water leaves the lawn. This layer is necessarily rolled on a roller. However, as the next layer of fertile soil. Further the rink also will be needed for:

• ramming the land after sowing a lawn;
• tamping the lawn after mulching the soil;
• laying of "rolled" lawn;
• arrangement of walkways.

It will not be superfluous to walk on the lawn with a skating rink and after mowing the grass - then the lawn will acquire additional evenness and softness.

The initial and subsequent (periodic) treatment of the lawn with a roller will also improve the quality of the mechanical grass mowing with the help of the lawn mower, and its knives will be much less stupid.

Let's not forget about aesthetics as the main practical component - rammed smooth lawn will look much prettier.

What is a garden roller?

Any garden roller, whether factory made or homemade, is cylindrical tank (usually metal), about a meter wide, clad on an axle fixed on a long handle. Capacity for giving gravity from the inside is filled with water or sand. It is inexpedient to use a log as a skating rink, since the tree does not have sufficient mass for tamping the ground - an order is required 50–100 kg.

The designs of the rollers differ slightly from each other - mainly manufacturing technology (factory or home) or surface type - smooth (for compaction of loose earth) and annulate-ribbed (for slight soil loosening before sowing and mixing the upper fertile layer). There are also mechanized skating rinks designed for processing large areas (for example, golf courses), but we will not consider them here, this is a topic for a separate article.

Acquiring a garden skating rink in the store, in our opinion, is not advisable unless you are professionally creating lawns. The cost of such a skating rink in Moscow is from four up to ten thousand rubles. It is much cheaper to rent a skating rink (the average price per day is about $ 10), or even make your own hands, since it does not require serious experience in construction.

Make a garden roller with your own hands

If you decide to build a garden roller on your own, then you have two options - the first is more reliable, more durable, more complex and more expensive, and the second, respectively, is much simpler and cheaper, the so-called "one-time" option. Consider them in more detail.

1. The basis for reliable durable rink need to take pipe diameter 150−200 mm of steel or asbestos cement, about a meter long. In the center of the base is placed a pipe of smaller diameter, and the emptiness between the two pipes is filled sand and cement mix mixed with gravel. A metal axle with a handle is inserted into the inner tube - and it's done!
2. Well, if there is no time, opportunity or desire for the construction of a “serious” construction, the “one-off” option deserves attention. You will need two two-liter plastic bottleseach of which is filled with small stones and sand. Then you need to fasten the filled bottles to each other with bottoms, and tie a rope to the necks, that's all! However, we will be realistic, to get a high-quality lawn of a large area, using a similar “roller”, will not work.

General tips for using the roller

• Observe carefully ukatka technologyotherwise the lawn will be permanently damaged.
• Use a roller to eliminate only small irregularities - a spade or a rake is better for the rest.
• When leveling the lawn in the spring, make sure that the soil wet enoughbut the grass is not!
• Before rolling the finished lawn, make sure once again that no rubbish or stones have hit it.

Subject to all of the above, you will enjoy fluffy green carpet under your window from early spring to the very snow.