Whilst rotary spreaders can be prone to flinging grass seed everywhere, including into flowerbeds, this EverGreen Easy Spreader Plus is a drop spreader that only dispenses seed, or fertiliser, under the unit as you walk (so you won’t find yourself pulling unwanted grass shoots out of the flowerbed a week later!). If using a rotary/broadcast spreader, you may find that you use less seeds/fertiliser because it casts them further but less densely. You can still achieve a denser application with a rotary spreader, but you’ll need to complete more passes of the lawn which will take more time. In terms of price, this is a pretty expensive model. It certainly works well for spreading different lawn products, but it does have its flaws. Primarily: assembly is a real challenge. Putting the whole thing together can take upwards of an hour – a fact that is not helped, of course, by the inclusion of fairly ambiguous pictorial instructions.

It has a 38.5 kg capacity, so we’re not talking about your standard gardening tool here… the unit gets hooked up to a ride-on mower or tractor, and can cover approximately 1300 m² (that’s about ¼ of an acre) before needing to be refilled. A hopper that’s too small will need frequent refilling so the job will take you a lot longer. If the capacity is too large, you’ll be pushing unnecessary excess weight. Make sure that the materials are corrosion resistant. You can help to further prevent rust/corrosion by limiting the spreaders exposure to the elements. Keep the lawn spreader dry and out of direct sunlight as much as possible to prolong the life of the metal and plastic components.As a result, this lawn spreader is versatile to use with a lot of different lawn products, and for a variety of uses too. When used with either fertiliser or grass seed, it spreads the particles evenly over the area, dramatically improving results compared to doing the job by hand. It’s a good choice for medium-sized lawns.

The main thing to watch out for are corners – it can be easy to accidentally distribute too much product. The drop spreader is not easy to ‘turn off’ at a corner because the aperture only closes when the yellow indicator is pointing to ‘0’. This is difficult to change whilst in the middle of distributing product. You’ll have a lot more control with a drop spreader, but it will take you longer to spread seeds or fertiliser across a whole area. When applying lawn products like fertiliser and lawn seed by hand, it can be difficult to get an even distribution. You should always refer to the manufacturer’s instructions because different models can vary dramatically. Most lawn spreaders have adjustable settings so that you can easily dictate the rate at which it will distribute seed and fertiliser.

My Top Recommended Lawn Spreaders

A rotary lawn spreader, sometimes referred to as a ‘broadcast spreader’, works by flinging fertiliser/grass seed out as its rotator spins. A rotary lawn seed spreader will allow you to cover more area in less time, quite desirable if you have a larger lawn. Ideally, you want to find the perfect balance between ‘as few refills as possible’ and ‘maintaining manoeuvrability’. This will depend on the size of your lawn and the density of product that you want to spread. Of course, the correct setting will depend on a lot of different factors, including your stride length, so there will likely be a certain amount of trial-and-error when you first start using your spreader. If you’re working on a large scale, you’ll be able to fit roughly a 20 kg bag of fertiliser or lawn seed into the hopper at a time. Their placement is very uniform because they will only drop seeds through the hole in the base of the unit’s hopper.