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New home lawn on clay soil

vegie82
Building a Reputation

New home lawn on clay soil

Hello,

 

About to set about laying down some turf after a new home build, and thought I'd ask for some opinions.

 

It's a clay soil, so I plan on spraying some weed killer around, letting that settle for a week or so, then using a rotary hoe, then putting about 20mm of premium top soil down before laying the turf. Would you agree?

 

As you can see in the image, there's quite a fall in this part of the yard, from right to left, do you think it would be a worthwhile investment running and Agi parallel to the fence about 500mm away, to avoid a soggy mess in this part of the lawn next winter?

 

Any other pointers please don't hesitate to say as its my first time doing this and I'm quite the novice.

 

Cheers. Craig.

 

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vegie82
Building a Reputation

Re: New home lawn on clay soil

Hi All,

 

There has been a lot of progress between when I posted and now.

 

Did what you suggested, Used weed killer, let it settle for a few weeks, got basically a dingo in and scraped off the top couple of mm then used a rotary hoe attachment to break up that top 100mm of clay.

 

Then way the fun task of approximately 16 cubes of premium top soil to create a flatter base and approximately 100-200mm top soil base in areas.

 

Ended up running the 100mm x 20 mtrs Agi pipe as suggested, approx 500mm away and along the back fence, and got a plumber in to plumb the agi and the connecting pit, and downpipes from the shed all in to the storm water disposal point.

 

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We let it sit like this for approximately 4 weeks to allow the top soil to settle and we brought a few more metres of top soil to rectify the high lows that came from the previous Topsoil settling at different rates.

 

We got our 120 sq mtrs of Sir Walter delivered early December, and it was a long day laying it all.

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That's out the front, which I haven't really discussed prior.

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And then watering, some more watering and did I mention some more watering... saying that though, it has all taken great, had its first high cut mow a few weeks back after 5 weeks after laying.

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Apologies for not many progress shots along the way, but glad that it's done and I'm very happy with how it turned out.

 

And questions, please don't hesitate to ask, because it was a very steep learning curve for me also...

 

Cheers.

EricL
Bunnings Team Member
Bunnings Team Member

Re: New home lawn on clay soil

Hello @vegie82

 

Thank you so much for posting photo updates on your home lawn project. It absolutely looks beautiful, the preparation and execution were perfectly done. Your long term preparations and weed removal will provide you with long term easy turf care. Because you've laid such a great foundation for the turf, it settled in very nicely with no dead spots. I'm sure you are very proud of your efforts. I'm sure our members will find your project inspirational.

 

Again, thank you for sharing your home lawn journey with us. 

 

Eric

 

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