Advice on using a Rotavator

[ATC1983]

Hi

 

Looking for some help on a job which is requiring me to rotavate a fellow's garden.

 

Essentially, the client's garden is utterly full of weeds and bushes - I've maintained this for him just by cutting it back once monthly. However despite applying selective weedkiller, and some seed, it just regrows as weeds without much grassy green. It comes up uneven, and this is compunded by the fact that the client, when he first bought his house, set fire to a huge amount of wood in the garden with a view to clearing a lot of the weeds out, so much of the ground is superficially scorched, to about and inch down.

 

I've turned the soil in these parts and the soil underneath looks beautiful, and weeds are starting to grow through where he has scorched it. But these patches remain large in the garden, which is about 15M by 7M.

 

He has taken advice from a landscaper whose idea was to rotavate the garden, however he simply can't afford the cost of this. I have offered to hire a rotavator for the day, assuming he pays the costs, and do it for experience, so I can later resell rotavation as part of my own portfolio and get a grip on the machinery, methods, costs, time etc to make a business model around it.

 

We are discussing what the best way to approach this is at the moment. We were thinking either:

 

1) Manually weed the entire garden, once it regrows after a recent cut, clearing this out of the soil, then commence rotavation, even out soil, then reseed or lay lawn roll;

 

or

 

2) Apply a large amount of weedkiller across the entire garden, kill as much of all growth as possible, then rotavate, evenly spread soil, then reseed or apply lawn roll.

 

Can I ask how you guys with more experience would approach the problem?

[Hodge]

How do, kill everything and start again, once it's all dead go over it with a rotorvator and pick all the big chunks out, rocks etc. then go over it again once you have most of the crap out tidy it up and level, if laying turf or seeding you need to run a roller over it. I have done this loads of times on gardens and they respond well.

[ATC1983]

Thanks for advice - think the client would prefer reseeding - how much seed would be needed per M2 - ie would you use a couple of handfuls per ft2 or what is the best way to do the seeding? I've seed distributors for seed - would these be good for even distribution, and is there an issue with putting down too much seed?

 

Once reseeded, how long are you talking before the first weeds start coming back in?

[ATC1983]

Also what would be the best weed/grass killer for this type of area in terms of economy, effectiveness - and would these damage future regrowth?

[headgroundsman]

Use roundup or other glyphosate weed killer. Leave about 10 days before rotavating. Then do as said above. grass seeds will grow very fast if put on late august early september. I have done it and been mowing in 3 weeks

[headgroundsman]

it would be best to use a general purpose grass seed not one for fine lawns unless you want to mow twice a week. Wilkos sell good seed. apply at 50gms per square metre.

[Mortimer Firewood]

As hodge said use Round up byo active leave for 21 days remove debris Rotavator it get rid of all the stones keep going over it till you have a fine tilth then seed using play grass which is hard wearing and grows slowly after your new lawn is established cut it often to deter any weeds

[headgroundsman]

very good advice above but if you apply roundup when plants are growing fast and actively then after 10 days it will have fully translocated into the roots and will kill effectively. 21 days if a little colder and plants growing less active

[Burytreeman]

where abouts are you atc?

[ATC1983]

Northern Ireland