New Lawn, wrong order?
Chris P
Posts: 4
Good morning, first post on the forum so here goes...
Hopefully someone one can help me. After moving into my new house I had a lawn that comprised mostly of weeds. My plan was to dig up the existing lawn and re-lay the lawn With turf or new seed, on top of a new layer of top soil.
I have dug all the old turf/weeds out along with some of the existing top soil but still have new weeds coming through. I have now come to realise that I probably should have killed the old weeds off before digging them up. Because of the way glyphosate weedkiller works (absorbing into leaves) I think spraying the soil with weed killer may be a waste of time? as it will not kill the old roots from the old weeds off.
I would be very grateful if someone could advise me on the best plan of attack for preparing my garden for turf at this stage. I will need top soil as I have dug a fair bit of the existing soil out. I can appreciate there are much better ways of doing this, next time I won't be so hasty and do my research first. thank you kindly. 
Posts
I'd wait a bit and let the weeds grow a fair amount of leaf, then you can spray with glyphosate - wait for it to penetrate the whole plant and kill the roots, then the leaves will go brown and die and you can dig them up.
You've got plenty of time - September is a really good time of year to lay turf or sow a new lawn - the soil is warm and roots grow well, and the sun isn't too hot and there should be rain and dew so that you don't have to water too much.
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
Thanks for the quick reply. I will probably leave it until mid August to let the remainder of the weeds come through and then hopefully just keep on top of them with selective weed killer once the lawn is down. Fingers crossed there won't be too many
Would you recommend any treatments for top soil prior to laying turf?
It's good to know I still have time, I thought I may have left it a bit late. There a a few large pits in the garden around the sides that need filling. i was just going to fill these with hardcore/gravel then soil over the top as I don't want them to sink! thanks for your comments
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