New Lawn

First thread, so please be Gentle.

I want to raise my lawn up around 2 inchs, however have a number of questions.

1 Do i need to kill the existing lawn or just topsoil on top
2 The lawn is full of weeds so worried these will remain in new lawn
3 If i need to kill it, what is the best way to do this
4 Should i buy turf or seed, slightly worried my gardening skill arent good enough for seeding or am i wrong and it is easy??
5 We have a large tree in the garden so will need to lay a grass which does not mind shade, which is the best


Sorry for all the questions, but any help would be greatly received

Regards

Tim

 

Hope that helps.

 

thanks for the reply, aiming to tackle this at the weekend.
Will Glyphosate kill all the grass as well, i am thinking to kill everything to be sure in the future?

Tim

 

The spray will kill the grass no problem. If it's a large area concentrate on spraying the weeds first though as the grass won't survive that amount of topsoil being laid on top. The idea of spraying the weeds is just to be safe in ensuring the roots are knocked out as the hardier, perennial weeds will grow up through anything.

How is the surface of the lawn as it is now? If it's compact this is a great opportunity to give it a little tickle to break the surface and aid future drainage and give your new lawn a good head start. The deeper the roots can go means the grass plants will be more drought resistant, healthier and able to cope with stress. As some of the area is shaded this will also help prevent future moss build up by taking moisture away from the surface and toward the grass roots.

 

Don`t bother weedkilling, just spread the topsoil and reseed/returf.

 

I did my back garden a few months ago. Here's what I've learnt in doing so (plus a couple of other bits I've learned over the years):

Glyphosate is a very effective herbicide that kills pretty much everything plantwise. However it doesn't have any effect at all on seeds that have yet to germinate. That means that even after you've killed off the existing weeds, expect plenty of news because they'll have shed lots of seeds. Not a big deal though. I've got a few coming through but not loads, and I'll just spot treat them at some point.

Right, down to my new lawn building experience from this year.

In my case, the ground was very, very badly compacted (like granite). This plus the fact that it is all clay and doesn't look like it has ever been fed, meant the old grass was all but dead. I decided to turn the whole lot over and start from scratch.

It was back breaking work. I had to use the pick axe on most of it for the first pass.

Having dug it all over, the next problem was it was very uneven. Its easy to get an even surface on a small area, but try doing it on a lawn sized area. Having got it roughly level, I made a contraption of two long planks of wood nailed together to make a giant T shape. This served two purposes. It allowed my to scoop large areas of loosened surface all at once, getting it closer to level. I also laid it on the ground at points as I worked, to so I could more easily see the lumps and bumps that still need a visit from my rake.

At this point, I probably should have raked in some manure or compost to help prevent it compacting again, but I didn't have any at the time, so I just continued without it.

I left it fairly level for a week or so, and let my wife and son walk on it occasionally to help get it to settle.

One last light raking and I felt ready to seed it.

I didn't measure out the seed. I just chucked it all over the surface. I got my 2 year old son to help with this, so I guess no precision was involved

A VERY light raking helped mix the seed into the surface of the soil. I didn't care that I could still see loads of seeds sitting on the surface. Nor did I care that the local birds were impressed by all the seed I'd put down. I figured I'd probably put more seed down than necessary, so some loss wouldn't be a problem.

A few weeks passed, and I had grass. Very sparse, but grass all the same.

At this point I acquired some horticultural grit and some spent mushroom compost. I just chucked handfuls of both over the new grass, taking care to not put so much on at once as to bury the new grass. I'm not sure if I did the right thing, but I'm very happy with the progress so far.

Where we're up to now is I've been allowing my wife and son and any visitors to walk on it. My son plays on it, and it gets mowed (on a high setting) once a week. There are a couple of small bald patches, probably where I was a bit too heavy handed on the top dressing, but it is a lawn. In autumn, if the small bald patches (the biggest of which is about 4 inches across) don't close up by autumn, I'll just put some more seed in them.

One thing to note, and this may or may not apply to you, is that my lawn level ended up a good couple of inches higher than it started, without the addition of 2 inches worth of soil/compost. I guess the reason for this is that I'd loosened it by digging it over. It is firm enough, but not compacted, whereas before it was lower, because it was so tightly compacted after years of neglect by previous owners.

In summary, it was hard work, but not difficult work. I.e. my muscles ached a lot, but I wasn't held back by my lack of knowledge or experience.