How do I get my back yard level?
by
Carrie Lee
+4
There are lumps, bumps and divits. The picture shows the large Honey Locust Tree on the right near the pergola. The ground has higher and lower levels of ground.
HI Carrie. The best way to start is to use a roller. This is best when done in spring as soon as the ground thaws. Then use a aerator to aerate the lawn. It has helped my lawn greatly. If there are larger divits then fill those with top soil. Good Luck!
Thank you Amanda.
Hi Carrie, 'Acceptably level' really depends on what you want your garden to have: Deck, Patio, Grass, Orchard.
Different species of grass eat less. Some grow thin, some grow thick. Buying Mixed Species Grass Seed is a Scam to increase future sales of topsoil.
The best grass seed for any garden is the grass that already grows green and thick.
Thus, As far as completely eliminating divits, and any other Disorder You must surely understand the cause [of divits and any unevennesses]
1. Most who get divits have divits because they have two [or more] kinds of grass [Species] in the garden. This means:
A. Grass 2,3,4 eats more than Grass 1 in a Real environment outside of a laboratory, where grass is grown on a Smooth Tabletop or Floor.
As Few Gardens have a Smooth Tabletop or Floor beneath the soil, do not expect Lab Results in your Garden, more than: On and between your sidewalk.
B. To reduce the amount of topsoil you buy, You need to raise and collect grass 1 seed that eats less.
About half a pound annually should do and let that grow in a grow box in Year 1.
C. If you are fussy and a spendthrift, who may like Grass 2, 3, 4 [which may be greener and grow faster], grow that instead of Grass 1. As: As long as you do not have multiple species you will not get unevenness, holes or divits.
D. To maintain Specie onward through the years you can row and harvest some Grass seed.
This can be done inside, in a flower pot, over the four seasons. Otherwise, outside, you need an 'ornamental grass area' where the grass you like grows 2 feet high, so you can concentrate on populating with that specie of grass by harvesting seed.
2.a. Top soil is like makeup over acne, it does not cure the acne nor the pock marks.
Weeds are like Zits on the face of your garden.
Pulling 7 inch weeds, and not filling the hole that remains with rock and topsoil, is a common mistake.
That mistake is a second cause of unevenness, erosions and pocketings in a garden.
2.b There is no such thing as a Weed Spray that kills weeds by spraying the top. There are Scams that eat monies of the naive.
So, Rather than spray the top only, You want to 'induce' into any heavily weeded area a mix of
White Vinegar + Rock Salt.
2.c General rule: do not pull the weed roots, instead:
I. Cut off the weed flowers with shears, and burn them
II. kill the weed at the roots
To kill a weed at the root, you hammer a stake [or steel rod] aside the weed, pull the stake and pour your mix where the stake was. It leaves no hole when the root rots.
3. Keep in mind, noone needs more than 3 inches of topsoil. It is called topsoil, because it is for the top and needs a firm foundation, just like a housetop roof.
Divits oft are caused by Too Much Topsoil has no place to settle. [I know this as I Excavated 6 tons of 'too much topsoil' from my own garden, and am presently putting in an accessibility path and a huge concrete patio at the clay area].
4. Tree roots cause unevenness in any garden because: The fullness of the tree at the top is usually equal to the fullness of the tree at the bottom.
5. Grass grows high and green why? Too much topsoil, [See 3], it would grow brown and dead if the topsoil was truly insufficient. Thus cutting an orderly lawn is not to cut off the Green, but prevent it from reaching a height where it becomes brown.
6. Unless you got a 3 acre lot or a farm, fruit trees, Grape Vines and berry bushes do little but attract moles, mice, groundhogs, snakes, rodents and rabbits.
These do not belong in your garden nor consuming your Garden resources.
Instead, they belong on a secluded path you do not need to rake, near a roadside you can easily get to, and/or with a park ranger's permit, donated nearby at a state or national park, in a place where yourself and the family can go together to gather 12 to 20 quarts of 'wild berries'
three times annually.
7. As, the general rule of green thumb is: 'Grass doth not a pathway make', thus, expecting perfectly level, from any garden where you have multiple species of grass is not something we can achieve.
Grass doth not an even path make.
If you need an accessibility path, put crushed stone or concrete in after levelling and landscaping down to the clay area.
Thus in Summary:
1. After letting some grass grow first in a Grow Box, [to about 16 inch height], you need to pitchfork out All undesired Grass [spray paint a square around the divots if you want to rid yourself of Species 2] and fill any hole you make with a decent amount of soil and topsoil. To hoe that evenly.
2. Then you can do what Amanda said.
3. Then plant the Specie Grass from the seed you raise in your grow box, (or Designated Ornamental Grass Area to maintain One Specie of Grass).
4. A well groomed garden has sections.
5. Abide the general rules, do not expect any miracles of 'home made hybrid grass' enough to avoid the common mistakes aforementioned, and you will do much better.
I know these general rules for an orderly garden are alot to digest for the habitually disorderly or scammed.
These DO solve all the problems which associate to or with: Disorderly Gardens.
It is alot of work to get to an easily maintained orderly garden, [which I too am in the process of] but worth it when the result is:
In an Orderly Garden you only need to sprinkle 1 bag
of topsoil, [if that] per 21 sq. feet, in the spring, to
maintain an even and lush garden from your own
home grown Seed.
Bring in fill dirt and use a shovel and roller to level it out - grow grass after leveling is complete.
I seen a guy use sand he brushed it into the dips & kept doing it until level
but use a long level slat of wood 2 find ur dips
JUST in case U make ur hills higher lolol
Psssssst found that idea on YouTube!!
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I would change the roof from flat to two down water sides with a trestle in the middle and add two down pipes with a couple of gutters
also you need a metal cup to cover the centre.
flat roofs attracting a lot of leads over and need constant cleaning and closing the gutters create the leaks you have problems with if you do not clean every 6 months at least
The option one is for no maintenance at all; the leads run with the wind and there will not be any leak.