Sod has no depth to work out: it is an area, a little over, and the pieces it comes in. What makes it awkward is that growers sell it three ways at once — by the square foot or yard, by the piece or roll, and by the pallet — so the same lawn is a different number on every quote. This page works out all of them from one measurement.
The figures are the extension services’ own:
- Pads of 16 × 24 inches, which are 2.67 square feet each, and large rolls 24, 30 or 48 inches wide, from the University of Tennessee’s Master Gardener handbook. A square-yard roll is the other size a grower commonly cuts, and a British roll is a square metre.
- A pallet holds about 50 square yards and weighs about a ton, Tennessee says; Mississippi State puts a pallet at 450 to 500 square feet. That weight is the thing to plan the delivery around, and sod that has been rained on weighs more.
- Order about 5 per cent more than the lawn, Mississippi State advises, for cutting round beds, paths and curves — more for a lawn with a lot of them.
Lay it in rows with the ends staggered, like bricks, so the joints never line up across the lawn, and butt every piece tight without stretching it. The ground underneath matters more than the sod: Penn State wants 4 to 6 inches of good topsoil for a new lawn, and the link under the answer hands this lawn to the topsoil calculator at that depth.
Measured the lawn on the calculator? Follow its link here and the area comes with it.