I have since use my Mantis for dethatching. I LOVE IT!!! It pull so much stuff out of the lawn it fill up a 40 gallon can and more....stuffed. The lawn looked nice right away, not like what other people warn me that it will look bad for 2 weeks. It does not beat up the lawn at all. It immediately look better right after. I end up re-dethatch few weeks later again and the grass looks very good now. Mantis as tiller....not so nice!!!! Jump to much, really not a substitude for even a cheap front tine tiller. I still use my cheap Poulan front tine tiller. Cultivator is a joke. It jump a lot more with the tine reverse for cultivation. I know it will work better if pulling backward. BUT, cultivating usually done around plants which is in tight space, where do you find space to pull backward. I tried for 2 minutes, it throw dirt all over the place, made a big mess, I quit end up using my hand roll cultivator instead. If you think of buying it as a cultivator around flower beds, think again!!! Get it from Mantis direct so you can return within one year free shipping. I am surprised very few people use it for dethatching. It work so well, no jumping, I can't imagine the Blue Bird can do much better, just wider so you dethatch a wider path. The tine look to be high quality that can stand up to use even commercially.

Thanks everyone . The Bermuda wont be back until Spring time for me ( Southern Ohio ) I have Tenacity for that . I sliced and seeded today , Im not expecting good results . There was alot more thatch than what I had anticipated , even after raking and bagging the clippings . Im not holding my breath its going to turn out but you never know . My yard was always tan thru the winter time anyways so if the KBG doesnt take hold , theres always Spring ! Ill just look at it as having a head start on lawn preperation for next year . I may even truck in some new topsoil and REALLY start over . Thanks again.

morpheouspa. Gloves down here for a moment. What claims are you referring to that I have made about mechanical aeration? Granted, I do claim that there are purposes for which the employment of mechanical aeration can be useful and it irritates me to no end that people peremptorily discount mechanical aeration as being without any use. (in the past couple of months, I've seen were you have suggested? that plug aeration might be an aid in pursuing some outcome.) Are you saying that I have advocated mechanical aeration as a necessary continued lawn care practice? (Do you advocate the application of a surfactant as a necessary continuing lawn care practice?) Is it necessary to spam this site with links to hundreds of university turf programs that recommend home owner lawn aeration not only as a continuing lawn care practice, but for the prevention of disease, thatch LDS etc.? For what purpose? They are just conclusory statements, No more valid than anything you or anyone else can produce. What you linked to, rather than belittle you, look at the facts: First some of what they call aeration is plowing (bad for me) but anyway I counted 13 studies and of those, the majority showed some improvement to crop yield, none showed a decline. They do,make a conclusory statement that aeration will cause increased weeds. OK fine. Based on what? No ancillary evidence even? Did they atleast credit dchall for the quote or maybe daniel? So even though your site actually supports that aeration results in slightly greater % crop production than non aeration, I say irrelevant and useless for any support for either of us. This argument has been going on forever, but if you take the time to understand and observe, there are logical conclusions you can come to and when applied either work or don't. If X then Y, put it to the test, and if it repeats, then continue, whether it is surfacants, aeration, corn meal or Bayer. So recommend on your experience and give your rational when challenged. Caveat emptor. My goal for my lawn, and for those I give advice to, is to obtain a turf that in the shortest time possible will only require mowing, watering and fertilization. I endeavor to employ the least expensive, least labor intensive, but most effective methods for a healthy turf AND soil and those are the ones I promote. My questions were for the reader and therefor need no response from you . I will no longer joust this windmill with you or anyone else, but I will call out anyone who "make [an unsupportable} claim... or [spew} any other blatant lie"

I use the Ortho yellow and red hose end sprayer with the dial. They've changed the design over the years. There are several brands with adjusters on them now. Ortho used to have the only one. In this case adjustment doesn't much matter. What I do is measure the area I'm going to spray, put in the right amount of shampoo, and fill it with water. I try to spray evenly over the entire area until I'm out of stuff. If you accidentally get twice as much there's no problem. This is a very forgiving process.