I just moved into a new house and the yard has a tremendous amount of thatch and seemed to never be taken care of by the previous owner. I was wondering what you guys recommend to do or if both should be done?
I also have a JD Ztr and wondered if those of you who have one have ever tried the attachments with those? or should I look into renting one from a local store?
If the previous owner didn't' take care of the lawn, there could be a lot of weeds too. So I would wait till the spring/summer to see how the lawn looks, then decide what to do in the fall. You may decide to kill everything and start the new lawn if there are lots of weeds. If this is the case, you can dehatch the lawn before fall. Core aeration is not very effective if you have a thick thatch layer.
ZTRs, even with hitches, were never designed to tow attachments like aerators, lawn rollers, etc. A light poly wagon with 200lbs in it, maybe; that is on level ground of course. Assuming that you know that there is actual "thatch" then yes you can dethatch the lawn. I don't know much about it, but we always dethatched early in the season when there was ample rain to keep the ground moist. You may also want to do some overseeing afterwards as well. Aerating, which should also been done in the spring will help to get air and nutrients down to the roots of the grass. I believe that a lot of lawn Care is experimentation; that is you have to find what works for you. I have seen absolutely beautiful lawns that nothing but cutting has been done on, but a good turf that's 50 years old with just enough shade and moisture can do it.
