lawn problems

Hi there im totally new to gardening and need help with my awfull back garden, under the soil is like clay so when it rains no drainage which has left us with a garden of mud rather than grass, and in the summer it goes totally rock hard. Ive tried spikeing it all and puttin new soil and grass seed down which has not grown. I have two little boys who want a garden to play in and the family to have nice bbqs instead of bein embarassed by it. Please can anyone help me with any suggestions be most greatful

 

Hi and welcome. I had exactly the same problem when I moved into our house a year ago. Clay soil that just hasn't been looked after by the previous owner, and has become starved and lost its structure, and compacted like solid granite.

I've taken the drastic action of blitzing the lot and starting again. I dug the whole lot over, first with the pick axe, because the spade just wouldn't penetrate it, even with me jumping up and down on it with all my 14 stone, then again with the spade once the pick had loosened it.

In the worst parts, where an unfinished building project had left the ground compacted solid down to a depth of about two feet, I excavated the top 1ft of soil away, then dug the newly exposed subsoil to one spade depth. I'll put the spoil from the excavation back again later this year, but its low priority for now.

Ideally, we should put a load of sharp sand in, and as much bulky organic matter (compost or rotted manure) in there too, but that's a job for next year in my case. In your case I guess it depends on how much time and money you can throw at it.

I've levelled off one area and seeded it with lawn seed. I've deliberately left the outer edges for now, because I'm going to get my compost heap in there in a month or so. Again in your case it depends how much time and money you can throw at it whether you improve all the soil at once, or just an area at a time, but if it is as compacted and starved as mine was, I would definitely say you're in for some back breaking work of digging it all over to loosen it.

Good luck, and keep us posted.

 

As an alternative to digging it all up and starting from scratch, I'd also suggest hollow tine aeration. You can buy a manual hollow tiner for about £15. This will remove cores of earth, which should then be swept up and you can then brush in plenty of lawn sand, or a mixture of sand and top soil (make up a very sandy mixture, though). This will help with drainage. If the area is particularly bad (and subject to repeated compaction from children playing) you may need to repeat this for several years. As it will be rock hard in the summer, now is a good time to go around with the aerator. This is certainly less work than digging it all up, but not an easy option - there's still a fair bit of manual work involved! This can be followed up with applications of standard weed and feed treatments and/or new seed - probably from the start of April onwards, depending on weather conditions.

Good luck.

 

2nd what Darren said. I'd hollow tine it maybe twice a year for now. September ish and March ish. Do this for maybe 3 years and look at top dressing after that.
It'll need work, maybe feeding and seeding but it's a lot easier than digging it over.

If you look around you should be able to hire an aerator for less than £100 a day.

 

If the ground is rock hard, then no amount of aerating it will fix it. The grass will simply die off as the roots simply can't pentrate the rock hard clay, and the roots that are already in said clay will die off because they can't breath. That's how mine was when we moved in last year.

Aerating it will help it drain, but drainage is only half the battle.

Overseeding a severely compacted lawn won't help either, because the young roots won't be able to break through the soil surface.

I'd agree with the aerating strategy if the soil wasn't overly compacted, because digging over is hard work, and the you have the nightmare of getting it perfectly level again afterwards, but if it has gone like concrete then I can't see any other option.