We've been tracking where you mow. Now we're tracking what you're mowing on.

The new Soil tab in MowDaddy gives you intelligence about your actual ground — not generic advice from a gardening website, but data specific to your property's soil composition, drainage patterns, and optimal treatment windows.

What's Under Your Lawn?

Every property sits on a specific soil type. That soil has a name, a drainage class, a native pH range, and characteristics that affect how your grass grows. Until now, finding this information meant digging through USDA databases or paying for a professional survey.

We pull it automatically.

When you load the Soil tab, MowDaddy queries the USDA SSURGO database with your property's coordinates. Within seconds, you see:

Soil Series Name — The official classification (like "Clarion" or "Nicollet")
Drainage Class — How well water moves through your soil
Native pH Range — What pH your soil naturally tends toward
Texture — Sandy, loamy, clay, or somewhere in between
Hydric Status — Whether you're dealing with wetland-type soil

This isn't guesswork. It's the same data county extension offices use.

Elevation Matters More Than You Think

We also pull elevation data from the USGS 3DEP service. Why does this matter for lawn care?

Water accumulation. Low spots collect water. High spots dry out faster. If you've got mysterious brown patches or soggy areas, elevation might be the culprit.

Drainage patterns. Knowing your elevation relative to your neighbors helps explain where runoff goes — and where fertilizer might be washing away.

The elevation shows up right in the Native Soil Profile card, along with a warning if you're in a high water accumulation risk zone.

Soil Temperature: The Pre-Emergent Window

Here's where it gets tactical.

Crabgrass germinates when soil temperature at 2-4 inch depth hits 55°F and stays there for several consecutive days. Apply pre-emergent too early? It breaks down before it's needed. Too late? The crabgrass already sprouted.

MowDaddy tracks soil temperature for your specific location and tells you:

Current soil temp at 2-inch depth
5-day forecast so you can plan ahead
Pre-emergent window status — whether you're in the optimal application window

When conditions are right, you'll see a green badge: "Pre-emergent Target Met." No more guessing. No more Googling "when to apply pre-emergent in Iowa."

pH Tracking: Map Your Whole Yard

Soil pH varies across your property. The front yard might be 6.8 while the back is 5.9. One needs lime, the other doesn't.

The new pH sampling feature lets you log test results at specific GPS locations. Stand in your yard, tap "Capture Sample Here," and MowDaddy records your exact position. Enter the pH reading from your test kit.

Over time, you build a pH map of your property. The app shows:

Average pH across all samples
Range (min to max)
Color-coded pins on a map — green for optimal, yellow for marginal, red for problem areas

If your average pH is below 6.0, MowDaddy calculates exactly how much lime you need based on your lawn's square footage. Not "apply lime" — but "apply 47 lbs of pelletized lime to raise pH from 5.6 to 6.5."

Recommendations That Actually Calculate

Speaking of calculations: the Soil Recommendations engine does math, not hand-waving.

When you log pH samples, MowDaddy:

Analyzes the average and distribution of your readings
Compares against optimal range for your grass type
Calculates lime application rates using soil science formulas
Accounts for your specific lawn area

You get actionable outputs:

"Apply 47 lbs of pelletized lime (about 1.5 bags of 40lb Pennington Fast Acting Lime) to raise pH from 5.6 to the optimal 6.5 range."

Not "your soil might be acidic." The actual numbers.

Try It Now

Open MowDaddy, go to Care → Soil. Select a property and watch the data populate.

If you don't have pH samples yet, grab a soil test kit ($15 at any garden center) and start logging. Three to five samples across your yard will give you a solid baseline.

The pre-emergent tracking is automatic — just check in as temperatures warm up in spring or cool down in fall.

What's Coming

This is version one. We're already working on:

Fertilizer timing integration — Optimal application windows based on soil temp and recent weather
Historical pH tracking — See how your soil changes over seasons and years
Zone-based recommendations — Different advice for front yard vs back yard based on their specific conditions
Irrigation adjustment — Water recommendations that account for your soil's drainage class

The ground under your lawn isn't a mystery anymore. Now you can see it, measure it, and optimize for it.

Ready to know your soil? Get MowDaddy →

Soil Intelligence: Know Your Ground Before You Grow