Extending Grass Area in garden

0103953

I have recently moved into a new property and have been working on the garden.  The garden does look at though it was previously occupying the entire back garden area but the old owners at one stage made this smaller.  The had dug out a trough to shorten the grass aread and make the outside soil.  They did not look after the garden so the outside soil area has just grown with grass and a mix of weeds.  Really the biggest challenge for me is filling in the trough area.  Please forgive my ignorance as I am not an experienced gardener but I was under the impression I could just fill the entire trough area with new soil and just plant grass seeds on top of it.  This will allow me to make all of the graden area flat so I can work on it a lot easier.  Can someone tell me if it is just a case of using soil and seeds or is there anything else I would need to do?   Just as a note the trough is about 5-10cm deep.  Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Fairygirl

Correct me if I've got this wrong! Do you mean there's a little 'ditch' between the grass and what has been a border? If so, then I'd say yes you could just fill in with soil and sow grass seed (if it's just a narrow strip) or you could make that part of the border so that it increases your planting area - assuming you want a planting area of course! I'd be inclined to  weed all the 'border' first though, get it tidy, draw the soil there right across the ditch and level it out before adding new soil/compost to build up the whole border again.  Does that make sense?

If you can post a pic it would help too. 

Tropical Sam

Can you post a pic as it would help?

10cm deep of topsoil compacted down, sand to level then lawn rolls should work. I said lawn rolls as it is a bit late for grass seed to germinate as we are weeks away from frosts, but might work.

MACAVITYTHECAT

Can't see any problem just filling it in.  I had a weird ditch about 20 foot long and 3 foot deep near one of my hedges and all I did was throw in soil and upside down turf as I dug out other beds. When it was finally 'filled' I flattened it and threw seed over the top and now it's perfectly blended in with the original lawn. Still, as Blairs said, at this time of year you might need to use lawn rolls rather than seed.

nutcutlet

I'd fill it, let it settle over winter. It always sinks. then sow or turf  in spring

0103953

Great, thanks for the advice everyone.  It is in essence a ditch that acts like a border but I'll try and take a picture tonight to let you see what I am dealing with.