Phil L wrote:
Rob Steed wrote:
Hello Gardeners,

I'm looking for some advice from you people if possible please
....
I know nothing at all about gardening!

We bought a new house last year and the builders only turfed the
front garden and didn't bother with the back. That's left for us
to pay out for (

Gradually the weed has started to build up and it had got to the
point last weekend where myself and the wife decided we better
get
out and clear some of it. Some of the weed had grown to about two
feet tall. You name it, it's there ... dock leaves, thistles and
all sorts.

So now comes the questions ...

We have managed to clear the majority of the weed but there are
still quite a few roots left behind. The land is very much
clay(ee). Now the majority of weed has been cleared, what would
now be the best course of action to take to prepeare it for
laying
some new turf?

Should I dig it all and then put some weed killer down? If so,
can
someone recommend a good weed killer please? or ... should I hire
a
rotorvator rather than dig? We also want to get the land as flat
as we possibly can before the new turf is laid so how would we go
about doing that? What's the best/easiest method?

Many thanks for your time and help,

With the exception of dandelions, very few other weeds can stand
regular mowing, thistles and docks certainly can't.
If you wanted to kill the roots, you should have sprayed the weeds
while they were actively growing, weedkiller goes through the
leaves
and into the roots - now that you have removed the leaves there is
little else for you to do other than manually dig out the
roots...failing that, just level it up and lay turf over the top,
sure you may get the odd weed here and there but as I said before,
regular mowing will keep them to a minimum, and let's face it; do
you
really want a 'bowling green' effect or are you happy with just a
patch of neat grass? - my bet is on the latter and a few small
weeds
won't be too much of a burden.

To get the ground flattish, loosedn the top few inches, rake it and
tamp it down with timber, do this all over and then lay your turf,
if
you really want to go to town on it, do it in sections by putting a
timber spar (about 4X3) down each side and put a spirit level
across
on top of another spar (forming a letter H) when you have the
desired
level, draw the cross member up and down without letting it leave
the
surface of the two side timbers, this will drag off any lumps and
fill in any hollows but is laborious and the soil is not compacted,
when you do compact it, you may need to repeat the procedure, but
if
you want a billiard table effect, this is the way to go...for
normal
meadow turf which can vary in thickness from 1 to 3 inches, it's
not
worth the effort.

But -- regular readers will groan as I burst into a now too familiar
song -- don't use a rotovator. Please don't. It'll chop up the roots
of perennial weeds, and each piece will grow into a new plant. It
will probably also leave you with heart-breaking lumps of clay all
over the place, which you'll have to break up by hand anyhow. Phil's
advice is sound.

--
Mike.