Possible help with grass growing on top of membrane.

colin1951uk

I had a job done last April 2014 where grass was removed from my back garden, a membrane laid over the cleared soil and shingle put over the membrane to finish off.

About three months later grass (and I mean grass with roots in earth!) started growing profusely on top of the membrane and I tried to counteract this using a weed killer (called Roundup) recommended by a local garden center. This worked to a degree but even so after about a further month it all started growing again and I now have grass over a large area 2/3 feet high. I'm frightened to strim it because shingle could fly into my back windows.

Other gardens close to me have had similar jobs done and they're shingle is perfectly clear and I can't understand why I've had such a bad experience.

I'm thinking of having the job redone which will be a bit drastic and furthur expense and even then I could end up with the same problem.

So I'm wondering if I save myself a few pennies and try something else to permanently rid myself of this grass blight as it's become a real eye sore.

Any ideas appreciated.

Thanks, Colin.

I_have_spoken

Sounds like a poor quality membrane was used. The only long term solution is to barrow the gravel off, replace and regravel.

Davesnave

There are two effectivre types of membrane:

Geotextile, like Terram, which is what should have been used.

The other effective type is woven polypropylene, which will stop grass growing but proves more slippery for laying shingle over.

Fly by night or inexperienced landscapers will use cheap spun-bonded membrane, which things like couch grass will just laugh at, I'm afraid.

sheramber

Round up, indeed any weedkiller needs to be reapplied as the weeds appear.

You could try something like Pathclear which lasts for months but make sure it doesn't run off onto borders as it will kill everything.

There should not be soil under the gravel, on top of the membrane. If there is then weeds can seed into it.

Youmay find your neoghbours pull up any weeds/grass as soos as iy appears and/or apply weedkiller regularly

Babbawah

We're not grown up enuff these days for our guvm'nt to trust us with real & effective weedkiller anymore . . . So I use grit salt on my gravel areas.

It can be fun watching their puzzled faces as you load a few bags of what is essentially a winter product (in their tiny minds) in the car !

It's cheap as chips & very effective, just spread it out then rake over the gravel.

Unless you're lucky enuff to live near the coast then there is NOTHING that will grow there.

Be carefull to only use it in areas where you don't want anything to ever grow again. Unlike proprietry weedkillers it doesn't bio-degrade. It may need repeating occasionally because the rain tends to wash it deeper, but IME that just adds to its effectiveness.

colin1951uk

Thanks for the replies folks.

I just tried a bit of clearing up this afternoon and pulled a fair bit out. Was a helluva job as it's more or less stuck to the membrane, however the roots and soil do pull off cleanly with some effort. The soil is just where the grass has taken hold and is not everywhere on the membrane. There's a long way to go though and I'm not sure my old back can handle it.

The membrane is quite thick, don't know what it's made of but it's pale/whitish in colour and nothing is coming through from underneath it.

As the membrane is doing it's prime job I think the best thing to do would be to get someone to clear it all off for me and then add the grit salt as mentioned by the last poster. Weed killer definitely won't work on whatever type of grass it is. This option would be cheaper than a complete reworking and hopefully will keep it clear in the future.

Weeding is easy to control but whatever is going on here is uncontrollable, it's almost like a new lawn growing only it's wild grass.

I'll get a couple of men out for quotes and take it from there methinks.

Thanks again, Colin

Davesnave

colin1951uk wrote: »

The soil is just where the grass has taken hold and is not everywhere on the membrane. There's a long way to go though and I'm not sure my old back can handle it.

The membrane is quite thick, don't know what it's made of but it's pale/whitish in colour and nothing is coming through from underneath it.

There shouldn't be any soil. Obviously, over time, leaves, dust and similar things accumulate, break down and form soil, but a recent gravelling over shouldn't contain soil. Maybe the gravel was contaminated.

Weedkiller i.e. glyphosate, works on all grasses, even couch. If it isn't working, you are either using it wrongly, or what you have isn't grass. Glyphosate takes 3 weeks to work and it doesn't persist. Blame the EU. Pathclear will persist to some degree and show results more quickly.

The membrane sounds like Terram or a close relation, so no problem there from what you say.

lardlikesdogs

You Don't have a bird feeder close by do you ? As it does seem odd to have grass growing on the top.