Testing your soil in north Texas is an important part of any commercial building project, or any reputable lawn treatment or fertilizer and weed control service for property owners. That said, in the computer & IT world there is a saying "garbage in, garbage out." And the same goes for a soil testing service or a DIY soil test kit from Home Depot. The test will only be as accurate as the quality of the soil samples you pull, then only as accurate as the quality of the equipment used for the testing.
Residential Soil Testing Service near Dallas & Lawn Dirt Soil Test Quality
Homeowners and businesses typically pay a vendor for a service for three reasons: they don't have the free time to do it; they don't have the expertise to do it; they don't have the tools to do it.
Part of being a professional, residential soil testing service in Dallas, is having the proper tools to pull uniform soil cores. For farmers doing agricultural soil testing their crops (like corn, wheat, milo, etc) it is easier because the ground is loose and tilled to a depth of 12-24 inches, which allows them to easily pick up samples from all over the field. But for homeowners looking for residential soil testing near me, it is not that simple. Why? Because unless you are going to get out a shovel and dig 12-30 holes (depending on sqft) in your lawn, you are going to need to buy a soil coring tool. Here is the stainless steel, core tool we use:
Our Professional Soil Testing Service Probe
I had a customer ask once "Why is all of that necessary. There is some dirt right there in that dead spot, just pick some up and put it in the bag." Going back to computer jargon, along with a little math: your soil test results can only be as accurate as your data sample. If your lawn is 3000 sqft and your roots grow to a minimum depth of 12+ inches, then that means you have a minimum of 111 cubic yards of soil for your grass roots to grow in. Soil can weigh anywhere from 1200-3000 pounds per cubic yard, but our clay soils in north Texas average around 2000 pounds per cubic yard, which = 222,000 pounds of topsoil in an average homeowner's lawn.
If you are planning on sending in a pint of soil to the soil testing lab, which is going to weigh around a pound, how on earth are you going to get accurate test results for all your nutrient levels when your "data sample" is not even a minuscule 1/100th of 1 %? Answer: unless you have the proper coring tool and follow the proper lawn soil testing procedure, you are wasting all of your time and money; people lie about data, but data does not lie.
How to Test Soil PH, How to Test Lawn Soil Quality, Soil Test Kit Home Depot
For you do-it-your-selfers who want to buy a DIY soil test kit and soil core tool for $75-300 (and Amazon does have some unsharpened junk core tools for $25, made for loose garden type soil, that usually breaks when trying to hammer it into our tight clay lawns), we have put together a YouTube video to show you how we do professional soil testing:
Otherwise, here are the professional steps we follow:
- Using a bleach sanitized, stainless steel soil probe, pull soil cores to a depth of 6-12 inches.
- Depending on the sqft of the area being tested, pull 8-20 soil cores. Note: if you have large lawn areas or commercial projects, then you must repeat this process for each separate area being tested.
- Throw out the grass and top chaff from the top of each soil core.
- Put all the cores in a sanitized, 5-gallon bucket. Chop the cores up with a shovel and mix them together.
- Note: you must repeat this process for each separate area being tested.
- Put one pint of soil into a zip lock bag, per sample area. Fill out the soil laboratory form, with all details about your recent fertilizer service, fungicide applications, organic material applications, etc. Mail it to your local soil water and forage testing laboratory.
- In our opinion, the three best labs in the midwest/southwest are the three universities most focused on agriculture: Texas A&M, in College Station; Kansas State University, in Manhattan; and Oklahoma State University, in Stillwater.
Since we are based in the north Dallas area, we use the Texas A&M Soil Water and Forage testing laboratory. But you really can't go wrong using any of these services.
At DFW Turfgrass Science, we don't just claim to be experts, as our director has a degree in Turfgrass Science & Golf Course Management. And separate from the professional soil testing services we also offer HOA & MDU landscape consultant services, to solve all kinds of disease, nutrient deficiency, landscape drainage, water, and shade cover problems you might be experiencing with your property. Remember: turfgrass does not die from old age, it dies for a reason (usually several reasons). We can help you find the reason(s), then create a structured, 12-24 month lawn treatment plan to cure it.
When you are ready to schedule your soil testing service in Plano, Frisco, Carrollton, Lewisville, Dallas (north), Richardson, Mckinney, Prosper, Allen, The Colony, Little Elm, Hackberry or Fairview please fill out the form below.
Note: our soil testing pricing (listed below) is based on mileage (and time) to the cities listed. If you live in another city that is close to one of the cities listed, we can probably service you, but the mileage/time may increase the price a little more.