On Thu, 21 Jun 2012 15:51:51 +0000, Owen28 wrote:


The roots of the tree, these branch out everywhere, will they break the
rotavator? Will they soak up all of the moisture from the grass? Will
they make the lawn too uneven?

Possibly. Worse yet, it can cause the tiller to jump and hit your foot or
leg. Wear safety boots.

The roots won't disturb the grass, nor will they steal water; however, there
will probably be nice crops of mushrooms of various sorts in the coming
years, and if there are large roots left, they'll eventually decay and cause
a local soil collapse -- that's pretty easy to repair.


The weeds, if I go over the lawn with a rotavator, will they grow back
through the new lawn? What can I do to stop this?

Yup. If it's a small area, then I'd probably use cardboard or other light-
occlusive mulch to kill the vegetation in the lawn areas (it'll take several
months). Then, late this summer/early fall, when growing conditions are good
for germinating grass, I'd till and amend and seed. Try to keep foot traffic
off the newly seeded areas until the grasses are well established, probably
late next spring (put down some temporary stepping stones if you need to get
from point A to point B, and reseed those areas the following fall.)

You'll likely have a little hand weeding to do, but if you get good grass
establishment (and follow up with fertilizer as needed -- get a soil test
before you start), you should have very little trouble. Mow the lawn as
needed -- be diligent about not letting it get too long and then scalping it
for a year or two at least -- and you should be well on your way to having
a nice lawn.

Do you know how to do a soil shake test? That will tell you a lot about what
amendments you might want for the soil. When I hear someone saying they're
going to add something to the soil without saying what problem they're trying
to correct, I start getting a little nervous.

I don't know if you can get this book easily over there, and it's a bit old,
but it's the title I give to beginning gardeners. There's a very nice
set of chapters on soil, water, light, weeds, etc., as well as one on lawns.
As you can guess from the name, it's geared to organic gardening; even if you
prefer to use, say, synthetic fertilizers, it's a good foundation for
understanding the basics of gardening and why certain factors are important.
http://www.worldcat.org/title/rodales-chemical-free-yard-garden-the-ultimate-authority-on-successful-organic-gardening/oclc/22810546&referer=brief_results

Looks like you can pick up a copy from amazon.co.uk for about 1.5 quid.