We have recently bought a block of land, approx 1500sqm (main site area, as it is actually a battleaxe block). Rough dimensions of main site is 20m x 73m, smaller ends ****** in a NE to SW direction. It is relatively flat, overall falling about 700mm across the entire length (from NE end to SW end).
We will be building on the 'low' half of the block and keeping the 'top' half for the main yard, etc. The top half of the yard has about 6-7 good established trees (one coral tree and about 4 gum trees and 1 tree that we have no idea about). The soil has a lot of clay content and the surface has lots of dips and hollows and a few cut off tree stumps (which we supect contribute to the dips and hollows). The grass that is there is pretty bad - the place has been overgrown for the past 6-7 years, so there are very very long grass shoots and it's a bit of a mess. We have mowed/slashed it down but are still finding that often we have simply laid the grass runners down and mowed right over the top. Seriously, some of these grass runner are well over 1.5 metres long and there are simply heaps of them. It's like having a grass weave rug on the ground.
We think it might be best to prep the back end of the block (the 'top' end) before building starts as it will be difficult and not as attractive to bring machinery after the build is completed. Thoughts we have had
(i) should we install some drainage? the land seems to hold water (due to clay content) and has quite a few permanent soggy spots
(ii) should we get someone in to rip up the existing top soil, give it a good airing and grade the surface so that it is reasonable even and drains to the sides of the block (more or less)?
(iii) should we get rid of the tree stumps? I think yes but hubby thinks no. I think the root system from the tree stumps is one of the reasons for the dips and hollows, so if we got rid of them and some of the larger surface roots, we might be able to flatten out the surface better
(iv) if we prep the surface well, would lawn seed grow okay? Or would we have to fork out to replace with turf?
We're not sure how we should start or what we should be considering. We would like to do this right the first time as we suspect it will save us grief in the long term.
Any suggestions?
Thanks in advance
Peta