In most cases, when a family purchases a new home the lawn is already in place. However, the people who constructed the home didn’t know if you would want a garden or pathways and where you would want to locate these things. Such decisions are the responsibility of the buyer of the home.
So if you decide you want a garden or path, then it will be necessary to dig out some sod from your lawn. Digging the sod up is not much of an issue. You simply grab a shovel and go to work.
But what do you do with the leftover sod once you have that beautiful garden and that cement pathway?
Don’t throw away discarded sod. Instead, recycle it back into your lawn.
(Courtesy: Brandon Rhodes of flickr.com)
The temptation is to just throw the discarded sod away. Yet even dug up sod is ideal for recycling back onto your lawn. Suppose there is a location in the lawn that needs repair. The discarded sod could prove ideal. However, if you decide to use the sod in this manner, do it quickly, preferably within 36 hours from the time you dig it up. Make sure to keep it moist and that it is in the shade prior to transplanting.
Clear the new location of vegetation, mix some compost into the topsoil and moisten the land thoroughly, then lay down the sod with the roots down and water.
If there is no need to use the sod to patch bare areas, then you can use it as a base for a new garden bed. Decide where you want your garden to be, and then cover it with several inches of good soil. Plant the garden directly into the soil. Overtime the sod will break down and provide nutrients for the garden.
If that doesn’t work for you, use the discarded sod as a compost pile. Select an out of the way portion of your property and lay down a piece of the sod. Stack more pieces on top, all face down and wet each piece thoroughly before laying the next piece. If the sod is full of thatch, sprinkle some nitrogen-rich fertilizer or cottonseed meal between the layers. Make the stack as tall as you want up to 6-feet.
Once the pile is set, cover it with thick black plastic. Weight the edges of the plastic down to the ground with stones or cinder blocks. Make sure that no light gets through to the pile. Let the composting pile sit until spring and uncover. There should be an ample supply of rich compost ready to distribute.
