Clearing My Allotment

So, started work opn the Allotment yesterday for the first time.

The top end near the boundary the trees is where the previous owner had compost bins, his shed (not there anymore) and general...well...dodo...

This is where I want to put my apple trees so I sarted to rake. Quickly discovered there was a lot of rubble, sand, plastic bags, weed cover sheets etc etc. Turned out to be a big job. Its then I realised last owner was a quick fix man, which is proven after I was in touch with the Allotment Association Chairman (the previous tenant had rotivated couch grass to get rid of it........ .)

So, I'm looking at the rest of the allotment and I think....WOW....thats a lof of weed to clear. 

Its mainly Couch Grass and the advice seems to be to fork it out. OMG

So, here's the plan, which I would value your opinion on - Will It Work?

1. Cover the allotment with a good dose of glyphosphate

2. Immediately top off all of the allotment with horse manure (I know somewhere locally where I can get loads!  )

3. Straight afterwards cover the whole lot with thick black plastic sheeting

4. Six weeks later remove the sheeting and rotivate

5. The following week start planting

Thoughts? 

Please!!!

it is so hard to advise about your options listed, although if it were me I would recommend digging out and clearing small bits at a time and thoroughly - that way you can plant in the cleared area and there is not a "dead time" for many weeks while you wait for weeds to die off.

Or perhaps cover half of it while you work on the other half.

Fatbelly's right.
It's too early to glyphosate, the weeds have to be actively growing before you spray and then you have to leave them for 2 weeks for it to work down and kill the roots.

If/when the soil is workable, could you fork the roots out of some of it, while you wait to spray? This way you could get at least get a bit manured etc now.

You wait until it really gets going!

Either:

Dig it all carefully, and remove every root your see.  This is a good approach, but is daunting for most newbies (and, of course an experienced gardener will know which roots are "trouble" and which are not)

or:

Wait until its growing well, Glyphosate, leave alone for a couple of weeks, then rotavate / dig / etc.

That delay may mean that you don't get some of the very early crops in ... BUT ... they will be things like early spuds that will run the risk of having their tops killed by Frost, and will be on your table perhaps 2 weeks earlier than "normal" crops.  Its not a lot to forgo, in your first year, in my opinion.

Beware that some pernicious weeds are quite slow to make an appearance - Bindweed for example, so your application of Glyphosate at the earliest sensible opportunity may well not kill of some lurking monsters.

For a new allotment I think that covering with weed suppressing membrane and planting through it is a good idea. (You could use cardboard instead of buying "membrane", but do NOT use Carpet)

Do whatever you can (e.g. Glyphosate in March - mulch with plenty of manure) and then cover, and plant through that cover material.

Squash is a great crop for this scenario - relatively few plants required, quiet a long way apart (they sprawl over a large area). You can make a planting hole, through the membrane, incorporate manure etc., in the planting hole and then plant-a-plant. After one year of being covered with membrane most weeds will have given up the ghost.

But you won't have a full range of Veg. in your first year.

You can do some-and-some.  Carefully dig, and remove weed roots, from whatever area you can and then, come March, move to chemical treatment for the remainder.  Plant the first area with Veg plants "as normal", and use Squash etc. for the chemical-patch.

For open soil cultivation Potatoes are regarded as a good crop for "clearing a new plot". Their foliage is dense, which suppresses weeds, and the act of "earthing up" kills off any weed seedlings that attempt to grow.