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I live in the UK and am looking to buy a house that has a "lawn" that is almost entirely comprised of extremely matted couch grass. I plan to fix this up but I'm not sure how much preparation is necessary to ensure that the nasty couch grass is banished.

I'm going to start by using glyphosate to get rid of the couch grass, but I'm not sure what's best to do after that. Is it sufficient after the couch grass is dead, to either reseed the soil with a lawn grass; or just get turf (sod) to lay on top of the bare soil?

Should I instead fork out all the remaining couch grass roots to ensure it doesn't come back, and/or get scrape off and get rid of the top layer of couch-contaminated soil, before I reseed or re-turf?

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    As with any chemical, read that label carefully before use.
    – Boba Fit
    May 28 at 16:20
  • Do you think there's a chance the couch grass has re-seeded? If so, then using a sod cutter to remove it would be the way to go. If not, then lightly (NOT rotovate) cultivate the soil to remove a little of the compaction, and sod the area.
    – Jurp
    May 28 at 22:21

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I would carefully spray with glyphosate. Wait at least seven days then cultivate (hand dig or rotavate). Then wait a few weeks for whatever is left to regrow before again treating with glyphosate. You will need to cultivate and prepare the ground if you use seed or turf to make a new lawn. The pros and cons of seed and turf are discussed here and here.

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