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Lawn damaged by car driving wood stump through it

joshuasugarmansNWCIUPWjoshuasugarmansNWCIUPW Posts: 5
in Problem solving
Hi There

New user here and coming for a bit of advice from people that know much better about lawns than I do as a new home owner :)

We have a small patch of grass outside the front of our house which has some decorative wood stumps on to stop people from parking on it.

This evening, a takeaway driver unfortunately drove into and through one of them which has left the lawn looking like a bit of a state. The owner is going to come take a look at it tomorrow but I'm not sure how much I should make a fuss about it - I've attached a picture of the damage.

My question is if this was your garden, what action would be needed to repair it/make it look good - is it as simple as pushing the turf back down? Or would this damage require some further cost/work to be done (and if so and it required external help, what type of work would be required?)

Appreciate any help and advice :) 

Posts

  • amancalledgeorgeamancalledgeorge Posts: 2,736
    Just not sure how much turf is left there in the first place. Just reseed it in the spring and for now easy enough to tidy it and do a round of weeding. Maybe worth reconsidering the presence of those stumps...not that decorative and clearly don't work in practice if there's not enough light at night to make them visible
    To Plant a Garden is to Believe in Tomorrow
  • joshuasugarmansNWCIUPWjoshuasugarmansNWCIUPW Posts: 5
    amancalledgeorge said:
    Just not sure how much turf is left there in the first place. Just reseed it in the spring and for now easy enough to tidy it and do a round of weeding. Maybe worth reconsidering the presence of those stumps...not that decorative and clearly don't work in practice if there's not enough light at night to make them visible
    Thanks! We only just moved into the property - I believe they are there more to stop people parking on the lawn as there's no pavement (but are also decorative as a side purpose). Other houses have stones or pylons - ours has these wood stumps. I believe they were installed by the builder and I need to check but I actually think that technically that patch of grass is legally owned by the council (i.e outside of my own ownership boundary). Though of course being at the front of my house I'd rather it not look terrible and dug up...

    When you say easy to tidy - it's throwing it down outside at the moment but is it a matter of using something to try and push the turf back down? It sounds like the reseeding would be needed either way? I have no idea about any of this unfortunately but as it was someone else that caused the damage they're going to come offer to sort it out.. I'm just not sure what I need to ask them to do :blush:
  • AnniDAnniD Posts: 12,585
    I would wait and see what they say and what they offer to do. Probably the best thing to do at this time of year is just try and flatten the turf back down so the grass roots are in contact with the soil. You can always reseed it in the Spring when temperatures start to rise. It's a bit too chilly at this time of year for seed to germinate  :)

  • joshuasugarmansNWCIUPWjoshuasugarmansNWCIUPW Posts: 5
    AnniD said:
    I would wait and see what they say and what they offer to do. Probably the best thing to do at this time of year is just try and flatten the turf back down so the grass roots are in contact with the soil. You can always reseed it in the Spring when temperatures start to rise. It's a bit too chilly at this time of year for seed to germinate  :)

    Thanks :) I'll just ask them to make it look OK again, whatever they need to do to do that... I'm not sure if it will be easy to flatten down or not as it was pushed in pretty hard (i.e I'm not sure I could use my foot to just push it back down...)

    Makes sense re the seeding as it starts to get warm again though - I guess at the very worst maybe they'll offer to give me some free takeaway to cover the cost of some grass seeds, ha!
  • FairygirlFairygirl Posts: 55,117
    I think that's fairly easily sorted. :)
    You might need to use a fork to lift the sunken area a bit, and loosen it, as the ground will now be very compacted. Then push the squashed bit back in, and a bit of seed in spring, as already said. You'll probably find the grass will spread across into it anyway.
    It might be worth giving those a lick of white paint or something to help them be more visible. Large rocks are the usual thing, and those are often better painted white too. 

    Yeh- a few takeaways at least  ;)
    It's a place where beautiful isn't enough of a word....



    I live in west central Scotland - not where that photo is...
  • joshuasugarmansNWCIUPWjoshuasugarmansNWCIUPW Posts: 5
    Fairygirl said:
    I think that's fairly easily sorted. :)
    You might need to use a fork to lift the sunken area a bit, and loosen it, as the ground will now be very compacted. Then push the squashed bit back in, and a bit of seed in spring, as already said. You'll probably find the grass will spread across into it anyway.
    It might be worth giving those a lick of white paint or something to help them be more visible. Large rocks are the usual thing, and those are often better painted white too. 

    Yeh- a few takeaways at least  ;)
    Thanks Fairygirl - I shall take all of this advice indeed. Appreciate it!
  • KT53KT53 Posts: 9,016
    Just flatten down any lump created and fill in the dip.  Reseed in Spring and you won't know it's even been like that by Summer.  I like the idea of painting the stumps white but might only do that to the road facing area as it won't look great from the house.
  • SkandiSkandi Posts: 1,723
    Get bigger stumps. We had exactly the same issue those are so small they are hard to see from a car. we got some huge pieces of elm that were knotty and therefore bad to split for firewood, the things are knee high, they are actually very light being old but drivers don't know that!
    The other way is just small stones painted white, cars can drive over them but they generaly don't.

    We came home one day to find the recovery service pulling someone out of our drive. they had ignored the (small) edging stumps and fallen off the drive into the soft soil next to it and gotten stuck. THAT made a mess!
  • joshuasugarmansNWCIUPWjoshuasugarmansNWCIUPW Posts: 5
    Skandi said:
    Get bigger stumps. We had exactly the same issue those are so small they are hard to see from a car. we got some huge pieces of elm that were knotty and therefore bad to split for firewood, the things are knee high, they are actually very light being old but drivers don't know that!
    The other way is just small stones painted white, cars can drive over them but they generaly don't.

    We came home one day to find the recovery service pulling someone out of our drive. they had ignored the (small) edging stumps and fallen off the drive into the soft soil next to it and gotten stuck. THAT made a mess!
    Good shout! Will have to have a look at that - Thank you :)
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