Filling an hole

peteb74

We've recently dug up some hideous plastic eyesore from our garden (only 4 years after moving in!!) and now have a hole in the lawn (about the size of a medium coffee table). Can I just buy some top soil and lawn seed to fill this or is there something more complicated to use??

valk_scot

You don't need more than 12" max of topsoil for a lawn. If it was a new build house you'd only get 2-3"! How deep is the hole? If you have poor drainage for example this would be an ideal opportunity to build a sump at the bottom of the hole. Otherwise use any poor soil, smallish stones and rough stuff to fill the hole up to a 12" depth, firm it down, fill with firmed topsoil to make a bit of a mound and allow it to settle for a few weeks before seeding.

SailorSam

Before going out to buy any top soil, look up and down your street to see if anyone is building an extension. You often see skips full of rubble which helps with drainage and good topsoil to top it.
I made my raised beds when next door built their extension.

Leif

Just be careful about bindweed, or other nasties, you don't want to import those. I might be wary of 'unknown' soil. I guess a layer of broken bricks or builders rubble, and then 12" of top soil would do . Things like cement and concrete are I assume alkaline, but probably not an issue for a lawn.

Beetlemama

I thought bindweed just happened, it doesn't really come from anywhere does it? it just appears a week or two after you've made the garden look pretty, and it's invisible for the first month of it's life, it only de-cloaks once it flowers and by then it's wrapped all around whatever it was you liked/paid a fortune for.

Leif

Beetlemama wrote: »

I thought bindweed just happened, it doesn't really come from anywhere does it? it just appears a week or two after you've made the garden look pretty, and it's invisible for the first month of it's life, it only de-cloaks once it flowers and by then it's wrapped all around whatever it was you liked/paid a fortune for.

I assume you are being amusing, but you could pick up Himalayan Balsam, Japanese Knotweed, Hedge Bindweed or Field Bindweed from unknown soil. Field bindweed can put down a tap root full of energy that goes down 5m or more, according to reliable sources. I know it goes down more than 1m whilst many shrubs go down no more than a foot.

Beetlemama

Leif wrote: »

I assume you are being amusing

...no I genuinely believe bindweed has a cloaking device...