United Kingdom 
Dear grow on you
I have a lawn about 9 metre square that has been growing about 3 years now. There is about 2- 3 inches of top soil above about a foot of MOT limestone. The lawn drains very well but when there is a drought or even no rain and hot weather for 5 or 6 days the lawn dries out and the grass goes yellow- like dead. It takes a long time then for the grass to return to green when the rain returns. I use lawn feed to help it recover.
My question is how can I prevent the lawn from drying out in the hot weather? I had a keen gardener suggest I did up the lawn metre by metre and put a few sheets of newspaper on top of the limestone so that it doesn’t drain so fast? Is a few sheets enough, should it be a full newspaper opened in the middle and placed down? Would this approach work? Is there anything else you can suggest? I don’t want to dig up the limestone because it may turn into a bog and can’t afford all the soil it would take to replace it.
On a separate note the lawn is a little uneven- bumpy not flat. To even this out could I spread some compost on top of it, would the lawn absorb the compost- would the grass grow through it?
Thank you for your help
Sincerely
Jonathan
13 Jun, 2016
Answers
PS Just give it water for recovery and save the lawn feed until its grown a bit. I suppose you could use a sprinkler regularly but not if you're on a water metre and in a drought you wouldn't be allowed anyway.
Were you advised to put down a foot of limestone, and if so did the person who advised you say 3" of topsoil would be enough? If they were professional gardeners you would have a good cause of complaining. How boggy was the ground before? Are you on limestone naturally? Need more info.
Yes the grass would grow through compost as long as you add it in fairly thin layers not big thick ones, but levelling won't solve the dryness problem.
14 Jun, 2016
If removing the limestone would result in a bog did you put it down for drainage in the first place? Its hard to advise you without knowing a bit more history, but no grass is going to survive dry weather and stay green on 3 inches of topsoil over rocks. Newspaper would be a very temporary help at most and not worth all the effort. Please can you take us back to when you first began thinking about making a lawn?
13 Jun, 2016