Turning uneven nettle-covered ground into usable toddler-friendly garden asap

[OhRosalind]

We’ve just moved to a house with a smallish garden. It was abandoned for a couple of years and massively overgrown, then the sellers cut everything down just before we moved in. It’s absolutely covered in stinging nettles and weeds with thick stalks. DH is cutting these once a week to keep them as short as possible but they are very vigorous growers. The ground is also uneven, sort of potholed and dips at side. It needs pressing flat or holes filling with soil or sand or something.

I know gardening is a long-term thing and most of my (overly ambitious) plans can wait. But I’d like it to be safe enough to use with DS (2) this summer, even if it’s mostly just soil rather than a lawn for now. DS has also been waiting excitedly for a garden so solutions that involve not going in it for ages are not ideal!

July and August are extremely hot and dry and nothing grows so sowing grass seed etc is pointless before September. Anyone have any advice on the best ways to solve these issues? I’d rather avoid toxic weedkillers and I don’t want to wreck the soil, but does vinegar actually work?

After you've cut the nettles, dig over the ground & remove all the visible roots. Nettle roots are white/yellow and shouldn't be too deep.

Designate part of the garden as a mud garden for DC with bucket & spade and hose and plastic trucks.

Get a picnic rug to sit on when you got out.

Plant one or two things that grow quickly, green beans like jack&beanstalk.

Start planning your proper garden

I know you don't want to use toxic weed killers, but personally I'd mow as low as possible, spray with a glyphosate weed killer, leave it maybe 4/5 days, hire a rotovator to turn everything over, rake it as flat as possible then whack some topsoil and turf on it - it'll need watering but if you get a sprinkler it's a fairly painless exercise.

If you don't have hard landscaping/tree stumps etc to get rid of, it will maybe take you two weekends.

I think I would probably dig over the soil and remove all roots that you find, to a depth of at least 20cm. Then all the soil will be loose and can hopefully be raked out flat to fill in the holes etc. Then I would cover the whole area with a double layer of cardboard to suppress any weed regrowth from missed roots and/or disturbed seeds. Then order some decent compost or top soil (you can order massive 1 ton bulk bags) and spread that over the cardboard at least 2 inch thick to further suppress weeds and improve the ground for future lawn/borders. Finally cover it all with weed fabric and get a sandpit/water table/other toys for ds summer enjoyment.

It would be a big job, but worth it in the long run.

Tbh, I'd be inclined to leave it like that for longer than September - just to make sure that persistent perennial weeds don't return, or if they do they'll have been so starved of light that they'll be weakened enough to remove easily when you lift the weed fabric to lay turf, or sow grass seeds, or make beds or whatever you choose to do. The cardboard will decompose and will be good for the soil (just make sure to remove all tape and staples before laying it).
If you can bear it, it can be really good to wait for a whole year before planning a new garden design to see where the light falls at different times of the year, where the frost hits, where gets wind, where is sheltered, and how you interact with the space.

I'm not an expert - but I have successfully eradicated weedy areas of my garden with similar treatment.

Sometimes nettles will pull out quite easily as their roots don't tend to be too deep. Let them grow a bit, water the ground for a couple of days to soften it and then go round pulling them all out (with gloves!!) The grass seed will actually grow really fast in the sun just keep it well watered.

@OhRosalind we had similar problems and sooo many stinging nettle and brambles. Start in once corner and gradually dig up the entire garden, remove all roots (it took forever for us a solid couple weeks), then put some top soil down, some compost, roll it a few times, and then lay turf. We did this last year and our garden was safe for a little one within a month , mind you we couldn't use the turf for a couple months but we just sat next to it lol

Oh and it also kept the weeds at bay since, no more nettle, a few odd weeds which aren't harmful and I just pull them out as and when I go

Glyphosate is a probable human carcinogen and has multiple other toxic effects even at realistic doses so OP is right to avoid it and other (potentially more toxic) chemicals. If you don’t want to dig out the weeds yourself then I would hire a couple of gardeners foe a day to do it for you.

And yes as a PP said you can put down grass seed in dry season but just water it daily with a hose sprinkler. We also covered ours with nets or pigeons would have eaten all the seed.

Some really helpful ideas, thank you! I was worried about fragmenting the nettle roots but if some of you think they can be dug up successfully then maybe we can pay someone to give us a hand then sprinkle some grass seed and hope for the best, though DS would be happy with mud.

Although it’s tempting to just kill all the nettles off, I think Glyphosate is banned for use in gardens where I live (EU).

Put a couple of layers of cardboard down and then bark chippings on top. This should kill the weeds, provide a reasonable surface for your toddler and eventually all rot in together ready for you to start gardening it when ready.

If you can afford the turf it may be a better option as the weeds struggle to contend, we did seeds the first time and they grew but the weeds were rampant (even after pulling them out), after the turf they've hardly grown back

Cardboard is quite effective, it grows back much weaker than before. If you could get hold of some pigs or chicken they would do it for you quite happily! Probably not realistic

How long do you need to leave cardboard for it to be effective?

I’m sure DS would love pigs or chickens but I think we have enough on our hands!

I will look into turf.

If it’s just digging to start with have you any friends or family with teenagers who might want to earn a bit of cash doing the donkey work I used to pay my teenage grandson when he was too young to get “proper” job . I second the idea of flattening and putting down membrane to see what appears and take time to plan the garden .

We had loads of nettles when we moved to our current house. We spent a few days digging out all the roots, they are yellow, it can be done.

Dont suppose you are ripping out carpet? I'd dig it all over ( ideally with a rotavator), pull out everything you can see, then cover in old carpet. Dig over again by hand in the autumn, remove anything growing, and seed/turf when the weather cools. I think those suggesting seeding/turfing now are reasonable for UK, but not if you are Southern Europe.

How long do you need to leave cardboard for it to be effective?

Google seems to suggest a few months.

I'm attempting to clear an area of my garden by this method at the moment but it is my first attempt doing it this way. My plan is to leave it this summer and over the winter and then dig the decomposed cardboard and the bark mulch into the soil in the spring.

My problem is that I garden on a mountainside and the ground is so rocky that digging it over properly to fully remove the weeds roots is pretty much impossible. I garden with a pick axe!!

The border on the left of the photo is the area I've used this technique, it looks pretty tidy too, so is a good temporary solution.

You can pull up nettles with stout gloves - level over, lay turf - mowing grass will stop weeds, the nettles and docks will die off - but do this on an area near your back door for toddler.
Do the rest more thoroughly as described above.

Asking friends with teenagers is a good idea, @sandgrown.

Yes it gets properly hot where we are, definitely couldn’t turf now and seeding properly (as well as planting hedges etc) definitely has to wait until autumn. Lawns here tend to be yellow in the summer.

Cut/scalp as low as possible, cover with cardboard, wet the cardboard, cover with a good thick layer of play bark. Quick, eco-friendly and relatively cheap.

This won't work for brambles (they need to be dug out) but it will work for nettles and other such stuff.

Do NOT lay old carpet down unless the carpet is definitely 100% wool - plastic falls to bits and you will never get rid of it in future years. Hideous stuff that's banned on most allotment sites now as we have lived to regret using it. Wool carpet will eventually compost into the ground but cardboard is better.

Do NOT rotavate it unless you have dug out/completely poisoned all the weeds that are there or you will just make a billion root cuttings that will grow a lovely fresh crop of weeds.

Thanks, @Purplewithred. No brambles thankfully, just nettles, mint, and some fast growing viney thing with thick stalks that DH says is an Asian import and now rampant everywhere (not Japanese knotweed).

Playbark is a good idea.

While you’re all here, for a low maintenance grassy play space is grass seed best or one of those mixes/clover etc?

I'd go with grass seed if you're letting a toddler free there. The mixes are great for wildlife but I wouldn't want to risk small children and bee stings.

Clover looks and feels lovely until you step on a bee. Unhooking a bee sting from a toddler's eyelid is Ninja Level Motherhood skill that I wish I'd never learned.

If you want to get on the garden in weeks rather than months i would be tempted to strim/ mow as short as possible, level out the lumpiest bits with either spades or a hired rotavator (depending on just how big the bumps and dips are) and just mow mow mow. My neighboour converted a nettle patch into a beautiful lawn just by mowing and mowing again. There is almost certain to be grass/buttercups/clover/daisies/dandelion in amongst the nettles with ready/established root systems, and they won't be killed by the mowing and will make a perfectly serviceable surface for running round on.