New flowerbed in existing lawn advice

Dats_rite

Hi all,

I am planning on digging in a new flowerbed around my septic tank vents and access chambers. The bed will be circular and 2.5m radius.

I plan to put polythene over the area for a week or 2 to kill the grass then just dig the area up. However I've seem a few videos on YouTube saying I should dig up the sod and discard.

Any advice? If I remove say 3 inches hor the sod I fear my flowerbed level will be too low, without adding at least 3 inches of new topsoil.

Thanks in advance

macraignil

Covering the grass for a week or two is not long enough to kill it. If you leave the sod there it is likely to regrow in your flower bed.

looksee

While you can clear grass by covering it, a week or two would not be long enough, you would still have sods when you came to dig it, so you would be no further forward. Either leave it for longer (not sure but I would imagine at least a couple of months) before digging, or remove the sod. The level would as you say be a bit low if you remove the sod, but really for good results you would need to improve the soil anyway, add a mix of top soil and compost. If you stack and cover the sods, then put in annuals for the first season, you should be able to top up your bed from the rotted sods before doing any serious planting in the autumn.

phormium

My father used always tell me dig up the sods and turn them upside down. Now I did find that some grass still manages to make it's way to grow back the right way up! I made a new bed last year and skimmed off the sod and added some new topsoil to bring back up the level.

I agree it will take a lot longer than a week or two to kill it off by covering it.