On Sun, 22 Aug 2010 19:34:15 +0100, "Mike Lyle"
wrote:

Timothy Murphy wrote:
[...]

I've got the use of a roller,
so I'm going to use that to level it.
The soil is a little heavy here,
perhaps because there has been a phenomenal amount of rain.

Whoa, there! The roller is a bad idea, especially on wet heavy soil: it
may give the appearance of levelling, but I reckon the high spots will
pop back up in due course. You also want a rather loose tilth for the
turf to get its roots into, not a compacted surface.

Jake's advice is excellent. (Though I favour seed, myself, unless speed
is of the essence.)

[...]

Tim - If you want to use a roller on wet, heavy soil, I'll go further
than Mike (thanks for the compliment by the way) and suggest you save
yourself a lot of work and just chuck the turf on a compost heap.
Plus, if the soil is waterlogged, turf isn't going to bind to it well
and even standing on a plank to lay it you're going to compress the
soil. Sounds like you need to let it dry out for a while.

FWIW, I also prefer seed. A neighbour dug up some bushes recently and
sowed some fast growing grass seed he got from B&Q. Fast is the
understatement - the stuff was over an inch high and looked really
thick as well within a week!