Moolon wrote:
Hi,

I am hoping for some help from some experienced gardeners and would be
grateful of any advice... please.

Our garden has really poor drainage and when it rains it just pools
and then turns into a muddy mess!! That along with 2 dogs that like
to run around the garden means the lawn is not what you could call a
lawn.

I have looked into drainage and we are going to sort that out.

Now here is the problem. We are working on a very tiny budget and
were planning on doing most of the work ourselves, but I am pregnant
and my boyfriend has a hernia so the tough work we were planning to
do, we cant - especially not before the summer is over.

So we plan to sort the drainage out, then rotivate the soil and level
it off.

But the question is -

Do we have remove the existing lawn before we rotivate it???

We are planning on laying a weed barrier and then laying artificial
grass after doing so. As we just want a simple garden with little
maintenance!!

I think we should be able to just rotivate it as we are laying a weed
barrier so it shouldnt make a difference what is underneath, but my
boyfriend thinks we need to remove the existing grass first. (Which I
think is going to increase what we are having to pay out!!).

Thanks so much in advance for any replies or advice!!

Rent a sod cutter. Cut and remove (compost?) the sod. then till it. That way,
most of the weeds will go with the sod, and you will start with a lower
maintainence garden.