Hello!
As the title says I was wondering if anyone can provide tip/help with me and my mom current project for fixing our backyard.
We moved to this house 5 years ago and have the backyard always look like this (pictures below). Majority of it doesn’t have grass and is just soil with layers of rock underneath them. We spent time racking and getting the rocks out but nothing seems to be changing.
What we’re trying to aim for is just normal lawn with grass I’d suppose. My mother doesn’t have any plans outside of that. Guess we just want nice looking lawn.
I was wondering if anyone has advice for us during this? My mother solution is to save up money and just replace it with sod but I want to see if their any other options So anything helps!
Sorry if the pictures are bad. I don’t know how to take any.
by TailorPure8576
1 Comment
Your mom is half right about the sod but laying expensive turf directly over rocky compacted dirt is a guaranteed way to waste money. Sod is just a carpet of grass and it needs loose healthy soil underneath to root into or it simply bakes and dies. You are fighting cheap builder fill and raking rocks out of the surface is a losing battle because the ground will just push more stones up every year. Instead of trying to dig down you need to build up. Order a bulk delivery of screened topsoil mixed with compost and spread a solid three inch layer right over what you have. That gives the new grass seed or sod a clean fighting chance without you breaking your back pulling endless stones.
Before you commit to wall to wall grass you should really look at that slope near the fence line. Trying to mow and maintain turf on a rocky grade is miserable. A smarter move is carving out a sweeping curved bed along that entire side filled with tough native shrubs and deep rooted ornamental grasses. That cuts down the square footage of sod you actually have to buy while giving the yard some actual structure and visual flow. Take a picture of the space and drop it into the GardenDream web app first. It acts as a blueprint tool that lets you overlay different bed shapes and plant layouts so you can see exactly what works before you spend any money on a topsoil delivery.