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Advice needed - new to gardening and lifted some slabs - Please help!

cashiernumberninecashiernumbernine Posts: 6
in Garden design
Hello everyone, 

I am new to gardening and because my back garden is entirely covered in slabs I thought I would remove some to create some sort of a border and plant flowers:



I have lifted the slabs to find lots of roots (I believe ) that are quite strong. How can I control/ get rid of these? They seem to run throughout the whole garden:



There are also lots of stones and sand from where the slabs were put down. 

I am not sure what type of soil is underneath. There seems to be a lot of sand mixed in from where the slabs were laid, and quite a lot of small stones. 





This was quite impulsive and now I feel rather lost! Any advice on what I need to do to fix up this area to start planting? 

Posts

  • SkandiSkandi Posts: 1,723
    I don't know what the white roots are but the orangey coloured on looks like a nettle to me. You'll just have to keep pulling them out as they appear if they are coming in under the fence/wall.
    As to gardening on slabs, been there done that! I did exactly what you have done, then I laid the slabs I had taken up on top of their neighbours so I had a raised lip to my new bed, and then I tipped in as much bagged compost as would fit and mixed it a bit with the sand that was under the slabs.
    It's more a picture of the dog but you can get some idea!

  • Mr. Vine EyeMr. Vine Eye Posts: 2,394
    I did this a couple of years ago in our garden, narrowed a path in one place and completely removed it in another. Lifted the slabs - dug out as much of the hardcore/stones underneath as I could until it was mostly soil left in. Then filled with bags of top soil and compost - mixed it all up.

    Tiring work!
    East Yorkshire
  • josusa47josusa47 Posts: 3,530
    The white roots look like bindweed - a plague.  Strictly speaking, they are rhizomes, not roots, and they enable bindweed to spread long distances underground and then pop up as soon as they find a chink of light.  Get as much of it out as possible, and don't compost it.
  • amazingamazing Posts: 8
    Hi, The sand and stone are typically what slabs are laid on. It should be a full bed of sand and cement on top of 6 inches of MOT but there are a lot of cowboys out there especially on new builds. The stones will most probably be limestone if they are MOT so very alkaline. If there is cement mixed in it will make it even worse. 
    To plant into it I would remove as much as possible or until you reach subsoil and replace it with fresh top soil/compost. Make sure that the concrete around the fence post is covered. It should be 600mm deep.
    I agree with post above. The roots look like bindweed. If they are nettle they will be yellow.

    Hope this helps.
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