Advice Wanted: Creating a Lawn

Hi!

New to this forum (and gardening of all sorts!) and i'm here because i have a task ahead of me.

Our back garden has sat idle for quite some time. 2 years ago i finally got round to cutting down all the grass (which was tall enough to get lost in). My dad came over and decided the best thing to do was to cover the garden in "resolva". I did wonder why everything died, but before i could work out he'd come over again and burnt what was dead in situ.

Since then, practically nothing has grown on it whatsoever. A few weeds, a cluster of poppies, an ailing rose bush and sproradic tiny clumps of grass. And i've left it for those two years. I have a sneaking suspicion my dad's been round killing anything green with resolva, since the bottle in the shed is noticably light.

Anyway. I've decided enough is enough, i'd like a lawn. I started turning the soil over (sandy on the top, clay-like and very compacted about 2" down, and at spade/fork depth its a red clay). I'm only going as far as the red clay, and i've only done a sixth of the garden but already i've pulled out enough slabs of concrete, bricks, metal and glass to fill a large box. It's as if the original builders dumped all waste into the garden and covered with not very much soil.

I'm going with turf, and i need to prepare the soil. I've done a fair whack of research but i was hoping that this forum would provide some more tailored advice! Basically: what can i do about this lawn, what issues am i most likely to face, and will this work?

Many Thanks,
Pilch.

p.s the garden has already shattered two stainless steel gardening forks.

 

my garden was exactly the same dug up everything but the builders !! i have a granite vein running through my garden as well and for obvious reasons wont dynamite it never laid turf or dealt with that sort of soil but wish you loads of luck on transforming your area

 

thanks bambooruth, and a granite vein?! wow, that's scary.

The worst i have (other than the assorted contents of a builders merchants dustbin) is anthills. There are about 5 big ones, roughly up to my knees. Hopefully they will get the hint when i start digging nearby and leave!

Of note: i have purchased a solar-powered ground pH and wetness tester, so i can "balance" the soil.

I cant wait to see what lumps of concrete underground will have done to the pH of the soil. How do i make soil more acidic? (my guess is it will be too alkaline)

Add lemon juice?

Pilch

 

oh no wouldnt be chuffed with ant hills,i`ll keep my granite vein must post a pic of where the vein starts about 1/4 mile away.suppose im lucky i have perfect soil (in my opinion)grow anything just add plenty manure each year from my mates croft,apparantely peat,pine needles or fine pine bark,agricultural sulphur ,coffee grounds and vinegar are options to alter the ph but i honestly wouldnt have a clue as never tried got your work cut out for you with your garden :D

 

You're on the right track.

Dig it over to one spade's depth (a measurement called a "spit" for some reason!)

Remove all builders rubble.

If it gets waterlogged in Winter consider putting in some drains (perforated plastic drainage pipe that comes on a roll, dig trench, put pipe in, just barely cover with gravel, replace trench-soil)

Break up the soil to make a seed bed - with a rake, or hire a rotavator if you need to. Make it smooth: get a ladder, stick a breeze blocks or two on it (for weight) and tie a rope to a rung at each end and then drag it left/right and up/down to spread out the soil and smooth any humps/hollows.

Walk over it to firm it - first boot down, other boot heel snuggled in the curve of the instep of your first boot, then first foot forward half-a-foot so it's heel is in the instep of the second foot, and so on as you shuffle forward until you get to the far side, turn round and come back on the next bit of virgin ground. Repeated across the whole area at a right-angle.

Gently rake over to spread the surface

Buy and lay turf. Probably easiest to have a curb-side deliver from a company such as Rowlan - choose the type of turf you need, fine grass for a bowling green (more trouble to look after, but looks smart) or hard wearing if all you want is a set of goal posts for kids to knock about on!

Unroll a turf, pat it down, do NOT walk on the turf once laid (if you need to walk on it for "maintenance" then lay a scaffolding board/similar and walk on that to spread your weight).

Lay the second row 50% offset - so that the joins in the first row are in the middle of the joins on the second row (otherwise when they will open up and you'll have a crevasse right across your new lawn!). Cut the turf with an old bread knife or similar. Don't put a small bit at the end of the row, any small bits to make good should be somewhere along the row - just before a complete turf that finishes off the row, for example.

Get yourself a decent oscillating sprinkler so you can water the lawn often. Its going to need watering most days, or every other day, if the sun comes out and warms it up. You'll probably need to water it that much for a couple of months until it is established, and certainly the rest of the first summer in very dry weather. Don't miss any bits! its amazing how quickly a corner of the turf that the sprinkler misses will dry out.

After a couple of weeks try pulling a turf by its grass - if it comes up it hasn't rooted through yet if you can't pull it up then its well rooted and you can start mowing.

Mow with the blades set high. It helps if you sharpen the blades, so it cuts properly rather than tearing at the grass (that's OK on an established lawn, but it will tend to rip out any turves which have not fully rooted).

In my experience you need ot start mowing as soon as you can. Good turf will be full of fertilizer and growing like the blue-blazes, and its very hard (in the first year) to get it back down to normal mowing length. If you have that problem cut it at least twice a week, and try to gradually lower the blades. Don't cut it twice - second time a bit shorter - you need to gradually work its height down. But you may find, as I did, that you can't get it to the proper height until the second season.

 

Thanks kristen and bambooruth!

That's a lot of advice! hope i can make sense of most of it ^.^ i'm hoping the easiest bit will be laying and looking after - digging the ground is a killer (my poor forks) and im spending more time hauling out bricks/slabs and breaking up the soil to find larger stones than actually moving soil about >.<

On that subject, is there any specific things i should know about my personal soil type? Someone mentioned "topsoil" to me, and how its probably all gone since its been years without plant cover. but if i get turf, doesnt that come with topsoil?

Pilch