new lawn for the inexperienced gardener...

hi,

First time poster - please be kind

I had an area of lawn around 24m square. I use the term 'lawn' loosely as it was infested with all types of weed and moss, was very patchy and didn't need cut - ever.

Basically the grass didn't actually grow. The only thing that grew was the moss and weeds. And it got seriously waterlogged after rainfall.

All of this made sense when we stuck a fork in the ground and it only went in 3.5" before hitting brickwork. On further inspection, the whole area had brickwork underneath with some areas also covered in 2" of tar. Not exactly ideal conditions for a healthy lawn.

So I've decided I want a new lawn. I've manually cut out all the turf into spade sized sods, and piled them up in a corner of the garden. I've then dug out the bricks and tar with a pick axe and piled it up in another corner of the garden ready to be skipped. Its been hard graft.

Once the bricks have been taken out, I find the subsoil is predominantly ash based. I'm told by the neighbour this is typical for this part of the country. I'm not too concerned as he has a nice lawn. I now have around 8"-10" deep hole in the ground which I have to fill up with soil and re-turf.

So here's my problem - I want to re-cycle the sods I've cut out as i cant afford to replace the whole area with completely new topsoil. As mentioned the sods are approx. 3.5" thick and the soil attached to the weeds appears to be fairly well screened. I want to kill off the soil completely and then I assume I would have to re-fertilise the soil and then top up with new topsoil before turfing.


What's the best way to approach this task? I'm in no rush. All advice very much appreciated! Thanks.

 

Thanks for your reply JWK, much appreciated. Would you say seeding is a better option than returfing? Do i have ro use pre seed? What time of year would be best?

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I'm quite happy to wait til autumn. How long does it take for the sods to decompose, roughly?

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I think what I would do, and I am speaking as someone who has sown a few acres of grass seed and is married to an ex farmer who has sowed many acres of grass seed, is to redistribute the sods over the area to be grassed down. Then hire a rotavator and spend a day or an afternoon rotavating it all together. This will break it up nicely and distribute it. It doesn't really matter if some of it re grows unless you want a pristine, bowling green type lawn. I am assuming you don't want that, particularly.

Weeds will appear whatever you do but the really bad ones will be controlled by mowing later. I don't really understand what you mean by an 8-10" hole. Rotavating and raking in should easily fill it in an level it unless I am completely misunderstanding you.

Now is a good time to sow grass seed; up until the end of September. It is much much cheaper than turf. Not instant but in a year to 18 months you won't notice the difference.

Good luck. You have done the worst bit already in removing all the old bricks.

 

Many thanks Redwing - what I meant by an 8 -10" hole is the hole left after digging out the 3.5" inch deep sods, and also the depth of the tar and bricks dug out. The old 'lawn' was level with a patio on one side and a chipped area on the other side, which I'm going to retain. Can I set the depth for the rotivator? I assume I don't want to mix the subsoil and the topsoil.

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It won't matter if a bit of subsoil is mixed in. Is the subsoil clay?

Final leveling can be done by hand raking. Rake the biggest lumps to the low point to start with and subsequent rakings the same and it should level out.

 

The subsoil is predominantly ashy / gritty. its apparently typical for this area. Not clay based at all.

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