Lawn Dead - Next Step

leiela

Ok i've spent the last 6-8weeks trying to kill my weed ridden lawn and i've sucessfully managed it.. it's now looking VERY VERY DEAD.

I have 4 days booked off work later in the week to "sort it" out.. now my plan is to pull up the entire lawn digg it out (removing all the builders rubble), Level it all off, build raised beds and hopefully lay the foundation for a new lawn.

Ok now i guess the first step is to dig out all the weeds etc? what is the best way of doing this??

I've been looking at maybe hiring something to do the "hard bits" any idea's what i'll need? i've got myself and 2 willing chaps to get it done (praying it stay's dry)

http://www.hss.com/cl/1014396/Gardening-and-Event.html

shadowdragon

well ive lifted two lawns in my adult life and on both occasions i wished i had used one of these

http://www.hss.com/g/62356/Turf-Cutter-Light-Duty.html

on both occasions i redid the lawns from seed rather than buying turf.

boo80

If you do buy turf instead of seed, check yell.com for a local wholesaler. We found one about 8 miles away from us, gave him a call and went and picked it up ourselves. Cost us less than a 3rd than what they were charging in B&Q and it was really fresh as he'd dug it up for us that morning!

leiela

Thanks

We hired a rotivator and a turf cutter and are working on the garden as we speak.

We've hit some major issues though..

1) turf has been taken off but the earth benieth it is FULL of rocks and Stone, we are trying to rotivate it and im working at getting rid of as much of the rocks as possible with a little seive.. but there are 1000's and 1000's everytime i get a patch done we find more and more, we havn't even started to level off the ground yet. Any idea's??

2) i have 2 big raised borders planned but in removing the turf we've discovered the ground underneith is pretty much rock and concrete, infact there doens't seem to be much soil there at all, trying to dig it out as we speak but im not sure how im ever supposed to make a raised bed here? Idea's?

ixwood

Sounds like a lot of effort for me. What's the point exactly? I'd have just levelled/improved and sowed some new grass suitable for the conditions.

A weedy lawn is good anyway. Much better than 100% grass for wildlife. As long as it's green, you don't notice most weeds unless you get close and look.

leiela

the point of the exercise was to turn a very uneaven bumpy brown, strawlike lawn into a reasonably normal ish lawn, we spent the last few years trying to improve what was there but it was really awful. You couldn't even sit on the lawn and have a picnic it was really uneaven.

Im also trying to build to big boarders to grow veg in, ive got tons of a veg in pots etc atm but it's really getting abit big for those now.

Right now were at the stage where the old lawn is up and gone, where just trying our best to turn over the soil by hand. We did have a rotivator but it didn't do anything just skimmed across the surface putting dints in it, the soil is wet but we just couldn't make the rotivator go though the soil so we are turning it over by hand.

I think right now we are resigned to getting as many of the rocks and stones off the surface and flattening it off as best we can.

The raised beds where going to be about 6" deep in the original plans, giving the plants 6" of compost before there roots etc hit the soil, i knew the soil quality wasn't great but i hoped it would be good enough.

However atm we are digging down as far as we can and removing as much "rock/concreate" (its about 90% rock) as possible but i think to get anything decent growing there im going to need to make the raise beds 12" or 16" deep and replace the soil about 1foot deep as well.

This is turning out to be a MUCH bigger job than i'd planned.

ixwood

Grass isn't that fussy. Do you know that the poor soil was what killed the grass? Is it in shade? Do you have pets? Does it get a lot of wear? How often do you mow it? What height do you set the blades?

You run the risk of going through all this work and then ending up with the same unhappy lawn!

I'd be tempted to just roughly level it off, cover in an inch as soil/compost and sow some suitable seed.

To level a lawn you just gradually top up the dips with soil and to lower bumps, open the turf (with cross-hair type cuts) and remove some soil . Although, I know that's not much help to you now.

ixwood

I'm always amazed by the amounts of stones as well. I tend to take out any rocks I find and not worry about the rest.

Most plants are used to that sort of soil, its the natural state. You only need 6-12" of good soil anyway. Have a look at the square foot gardening site, he insists that you only need 6 inches of soil for everything. The theory is that if you provide 6 " of good moisture retentive soil, they plants roots don;t need to go searching for water or nutrients.

Lotus-eater

Well Mooli, parsnips and carrots would struggle a bit in 6 inches

And you would be fine of course unless it was a hot summer, then the plants would wilt faster than a 16 year old on a stag do....
Unless you watered everyday (which is how you build the 16 year old up as well)

ixwood

Take it up with the Square Foot Gardening dude.

He recommends using a moisture retentive mix and grows carrots no problem. I know traditional gardeners don't like the newer "fancy" or "gimmick" ways, but SFG really is brilliant. Browse the website, you might well be inspired to try it. Even if it's just to prove it doesn't work for carrots!

Lotus-eater

I don't need to try it, I used to have 6 inches of lawn on top of a concrete slab, every summer the grass would die, in the end I struggled and dug it up.
If you have 6" of good soil on top of rubbish soil, it will be fine, if you have it on top of concrete, stupid idea.