Following the installation of your Green roof by RLW Roofing, a maintenance schedule should be organised to ensure the best opportunity for the roof to survive. It is important to recognise that, though the sedums are generally maintenance free, they will need some basic care and attention once or twice per year and particularly in the few months after initial installation.
Please note that the sedum plants will not be “green” all year around. It is quite common for the plants to change colour at different times of the year,particularly when under stress from, say, lack of water or in frosty conditions. In the spring and summer the plants will flower and and it is quite common for some of the varieties of plant in the blanket to die back slightly in the winter. If you want it to remain “green and luscious” in dry conditions, you should consider installing an irrigation system.
Maintenance should be carried out to keep the system healthy. The system should be inspected twice annually, once in the spring to inspect drains, fertilise and weed and one visit in the autumn to inspect and weed. All weeds should be removed. Any bare patches can be repaired by taking small sections of sedum from elsewhere and patching. Appropriate care should be taken to ensure safety when attending to a green roof. Some of the materials can be slippery when wet and edge protection/harness should always be used. Please check government guidelines for working at heights.
During the first two months after installation the sedum blanket recovers from being moved and agitated during the transportation and installation. Should the weather be particularly dry during this period then watering is essential to ensure the green roof establishes itself as quickly as possible. This should be administered once every two to three days via hose or sprinkler system until system is at full saturation.
Regular checks should be undertaken to ensure that high winds or heavy rainfall has not moved or dislodged any of the materials. This is essential during the first few months as the sedum plants will not have fully rooted into the underlying layers and will be more vulnerable. The movement of products is unlikely but possible in extremes of weather. Should it move, providing it has not been damaged, simply move it back and water in well.
Open drains should be checked for build up of dead vegetative material and cleaned as appropriate at each 6 month/annual inspection. This also applies to covered drainage outlets.
Annual inspections of the sedum blanket should be made to check continual growth and coverage of the sedum. In the unlikely event the sedum appear to be of low coverage or struggling then fertiliser should be applied to aid long-term growth.
RLW Roofing recommend that sedum fertiliser be applied twice annually for long-term healthy growth of the sedum.
Customers can apply fertiliser by hand.
