I actually pull out the sod around the head in a circle about 8-10 inches wide using a small spade/trowel.

Push into the sod about 5-6 inches deep in that 8-10 circle around the head, then dig your fingers into the seams on each side and pull the sod right off.

Then, have a bucket next to you and use the spade to dig out all the dirt around the head down to the coupler/elbow/inline/whatever so that you don't get runoff into the lines when you take the head off.

Do your thing, put the dirt back in and pack it just enough so that the sod won't stick up above the rest of the ground, and then replace the sod. Done.

It sounds like a pain, but it's really not. Once I got the hang of it, I was replacing heads in just a couple minutes.

Here are a couple of mine:

- when you dig out the dirt, instead of a bucket, use an upside down plastic trashcan lid or plastic tub lid to place the dirt on as you dig it out. That way, you will have *all* the dirt to put back in the hole, AND you don't have to try to hit a bucket while you were digging it out. I actually prefer the square tub lid to the trashcan lid.

- I make a big high "L" to blow the dirt and gunk out of the system before putting on a new head. When you dig out the old sprinkler head, after you twist it off, of course dirt is falling into that opening. If you turn on the water to blow it out, you get a big hole full of water and mud. And much of it goes right back into the system, defeating the purpose. So what you need, is to blow the water out and have it land far away from the hole! Get a long section of riser pipe (3 foot), an elbow and another section of 3-foot riser pipe to connect to the elbow. So you have this big "L". You put one end of the L onto the coupler down in the hole, turn on the water and the water shoots out, 3 feet away, not filling your hole with water! what a great deal! carefully, carefully unscrew the L, put on the new head and you are good to go!

Also, you can often get away with replacing the 'insides' of the sprinkler head. You can flush the debris by turning on the zone for a short burst; the overflow is channeled over the outer body and down towards the base of the riser.