Removing grass

Sorry I know this tread has come and gone over the years but can you run me through the best way of going about it and when:

I have some lawn ( land ) quite a distance away from my house it is about 20m x 2m steep sloping.
I would like to remove all the grass and fill the area with bare root shrubs this autumn. I what to use chemicals to kill the grass and I'm thinking now would be a good time to save me the job of strimming it all summer.

Could I use roundup and if so is it just a case of raking over the soil to remove the dead grass and could I do this next month ?

Or can I use a stronger weedkiller (forgot the name of it now ) the one that would prevent anything growing for up to 6 month, which would be ideal keeping the area weed free until late in the year ready for planting ?

look forward for some needed advice !!!

 

Hi Bally,

You could use weedkiller, but as your site is on a slope and you will not be planting anything until autumn, I am a bit worrried about heavy rain washing your topsoil downhill.

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2m X 50m Weed Control / driveway / landscapeing fabric, 100gsm: Amazon.co.uk: Home & Garden


You could put this straight over the grass and weight or peg it down and the grass should die down. In the autumn you could either remove it or leave it in place and cut out planting holes for your shrubs, covering the rest in bark chipppings.

 

If you spray with roundup now it will be "fallow" all summer, and lots of weeds will materialise. You could spray later on (and take a "hay crop" in the meantime), but once it gets really dry in the Summer then Roundup probably won't work so well.

I like Blackthorn's idea of putting down a weed barrier, and then planting through it. The shrubs will need protecting from the weeds for their first 3 years, or so, until they fill the whole area.

However, the shrubs would do much better if the soil had been "worked". Digging it, and burying the "turf" face down at the bottom as you dig, would be ideal. I presume getting a Rotavator up the steep slope won't work? (Rotavator will cut up all the weed roots, so you'll get more, but I would then cover it with weed-suppressing membrane ready to plant through in the Autumn.

Couple of other thoughts:

Incorporating some compost or manure would help the shrubs a lot. That will be very hard to do after you put the membrane down - put on the top and rotavate / dig in, or just put it on the top if you are not going to cultivate at all.

Also irrigation of the shrubs. Laying an irrigation hose under the membrane would be good, but that would require that you know what shrubs are going where - so you can put a dripper next to each plant, so I suppose that will have to go on after planting - and thus be above the membrane.

 

I wouldn't think that digging would be necessary myself. As the grass rots down the worms will do the digging and aeriating for you.

If you make the cuts by cutting a large cross into the membrane and folding it back, the shrub can then be planted and mulched with organic matter and the membrane put back over it. Bark chippings can then cover the membrane between the shrubs.

 

Generally I go along with Blackthorn but would do it slightly differently.

In order to get the membrane nice and flat I would hit the area Roundup and clear away the debris with a strimmer/brushcutter. I would then use Roundup again on the new weed growth and after allowing the weedkiller to be absorbed I would put down the membrane digging in the egdes. Then plant as Blackthorn says, rembering to add something like bone meal in the planting holes.

If the slope is steep I doubt the the woodchip would stay in place.

Trouble with long-lasting weed killer is that it can still be in the soil when you get to replanting.

If the plot is not suitable for the membrane you will need to keep hitting the area with Roundup (other products are available) until you plant up

 

I think Roundup plus Membrane is doubling the cost, when the membrane should kill the weeds as effectively as the chemical.

Agree about long-lasting weed killer, avoid that like the plague! "Last for six months" can also means "Lasts for years" !! not to mention "Will contaminate water when it rains and run down the hill killing everything it finds" :(

Not all long-lasting weed killers do that, but Roundup will do a good job, and is comparatively safe

 

Don't use membrane, It is a recipe for disaster and rarely sorts out the weeds, frequently they grow through were the shrubs are planted or through the membrane.

Spray it now then around twice more this season, this way you'll kill off all the weed seeds that will germinate, giving a clear run for autumn planting. Nothing to stop you spraying off any weeds that come up the following year as long as you use a spray guard on your sprayer either that or dig or hoe them up.

 

Bally : What sorts of things are you planning to plant? 2M is a pretty narrow strip - might be there is a "different way"

 

Thanks for the replies everyone.
I bought a new house last year with a good size garden the builder fenced the boundary off, but at the bottom of the garden over the fence is the bit of land mentioned, that also belongs to me.
The first job I did when I move in was to plant a 20m privet to prevent dogs getting and making a mess.

( sorry its a little difficult to explain ) so now as the grass is difficult to cut I would like to plant waves of Dogwood , Laural, Hawthorn, buddleia, dog rose kind of a mixed hedge affect and I will keep the privet low at the front.

I'm hoping this mixed hedge will give me two benefits .
1) it will screen the road off from the garden giving me more privacy.

2) once the shrubs grow mature I can lose the boundary fence and the Privet will become the the new Boundary.

Hope this post makes sense to you all !!