Topic: 're: advice on how to get rid of grass on my new allotment

[RowenaBland]

just taken on a new allotment, I have been given various advice as to how to get rid of the grass so I can get digging. I currently have matting laid out on a section of the grass. I have also been advised to use Round up. What is the most effective method you can recommend and I'm gardening on a budget. Thanks

[goodlife]

I think you got most of the answers with the 'rotavating post'...if it is more of lawn grass and not grass like couch (serious weed!)..lawn type grass with shallow, fine fibrous roots will readily die if not allowed see light..so piling it up like bricks with cover would work..or you could also dig deep trench and drop the turf slice in the bottom of it upside down and fill the trench up with soil.
If it is coarse grass with thick wondering roots...chop the roots up, move the about and you end up with 'million' more plants making the situation worst then it already was. Remedy for that is either to take chemical route (in right time of the year and in right weather conditions !!!!!)..but it would not be until well into growing season that the ground would be ready for the next step of turning it over. Or if and when the soil is workable condition..although being slow option, you would turn spade/fork full over at the time removing any obvious roots as you go along. Hard as it may be for your body and slow progress...but that soil that you've gone over is useable there and then. Coming spring you have less waiting time to get the preparations done and instead you are free to get going with seeds and plants..  

[Digeroo]

I think the answer to grass is to turn it under upsidedown, making sure there is no green showing and plant large crops because they are easier to hoe around.  Courgette, potato, broad beans etc and then every time you see even a hint of grass showing above the ground hoe its head off.   In the end the grass gives up, though couch can take quite a long time.

I took over a very weedy patch Feb last year and one piece had been a path so the ground was not only covered in course grass but the soil was solid.  I cut off the grass just below ground level and then hoed it.  Then continued hoeing twice a week for about 2 months.  Part were potatoes and the rest I sowed dwarf beans as a ground cover.  There is no sign of the grass now.   

Potatoes and courgettes in particular seem to clean up soil, they seem to deter the weeds.