"Nowhere" wrote in message
...
Hi

Being a real novice at gardening I have some basic questions

1. I have recently cleared an area of ground that was covered in
nettles, weeds etc and want to prepare it ready for laying some turf
and planting some shrubs I want to prepare the area and am concerned
about the nettle roots etc underground and how to deal with them I
would like rotovate and add some extra topsoil / sand etc Is this OK or
will this make weed regrowth worse Any alternatives I should try?

I'd look at putting a membrane down and planting shrubs through that. I have
a bed that was previously a nettle patch. It's been covered for 5 months
with a heavy weight porous membrane while I wait for time to do something
with it. No sign of any regrowth unlike other areas. Some say that it
compacts the ground and makes it harder to replant later. I'm not that keen
a Gardner so I won't be doing that on a regular basis.

If it's not a huge area and the soil breaks up easily I'd look at motivating
and then sieving the soil. Buy or make a large sloping sieve that you can
just shovel soil at. The stones and roots slide down and the dirt falls
through.

Otherwise just do what you propose and paint any nettles that regrow with
glycophosphate as soon as they are in leaf. That stuf is taken down into the
roots so you need to allow time for it to work before pulling any out.