Poor Drainage

Evening all

As a few of you may know already I have just started gutting my garden. Over the last few month since I moved in I have noticed that when it rains the garden gets very water logged (poor drainage). The soil to me seems very claye, would it be a good idea to dig away a good few inces and replace with top soil or is this a waste of time or is there a betta way to improve drainage. I'm not worryed about the grass it's in a realy bad way and think it would be easyer to remove and start again.

Cheers

 

MY grass looks pretty bad too, and the hedges. The very cold weather has given then a battering, I would wait and see how they recover in the Spring - I expect they will be fine.

Only real solution to waterlogged garden is drainage. If you have a slope, or you could make a soak-away in one corner, then I think putting a drain in makes a huge difference to a garden.

You'll need to dig a trench, put an inch or tow of gravel in, then some perforated drainage pipe (comes on a roll, its a corrugated pipe with little slits in it), cover the pipe with more gravel, and then backfill with soil / turf etc.

If you don't have somewhere for it to run to then dig a deep hole at the lowest point, fill full of rubble, then some gravel on top, and cover with soil / turf etc. to make your soak-away.

 

I would look to improve it as it is first, my lawn looked awful two weeks ago, I cleared the leaves and went over it with one of those hollow tined aerators and went round sprinkling sharp sand. Last weekend my hubby gave it its first very light mow and now-just days later it looks pretty good again-not a bowling green by any standards but come April I will repair with lawn seed and lawn soil and it will be fine I`m sure. I`m am not a fan of lawns but after a full and frank discussion with my hubby I have had to concede to it staying on the proviso that it gets looked after by him as much as by me so we`ll see.

 

My experience has shown that this has very limited benefit indeed
If you can imagine just how little water a hole filled with rubble will hold, you can begin to understand the problem
I broke my own back doing this and the benefits I have received have been minimal to a point of being non existant

 

Just dig in loads of well rotted organic matter and grit. As long as the top 8 or so inches drain well and have good aeration, the excess moisture will be able to evaporate off before it builds up to the point of being waterlogged. Then with a few thirsty plants in (like your hedge), the problem should be solved.

 

To be fair I think I get the benefit of having three great big trees so concur with clueless as before there`s work ahead.

 

Clueless is right. I used loads of horsepoo and the worms got to work. It also helps to plant the right plants. ie those that like water. Ive now got cornus everywhere.

 

Hello all

Thanks for the advice. Spent a good party yesterday cutting the hedge down and all day today trying to dig out the stumps and still only half way, let’s hope it doesn’t rain in the morn. Anyway I may have the reason as to why drainage is a problem, on the other side of the fence is a pathway that is at least a half foot above my side of the fence. So not sure what to do next. I have looked at doing french draining before but there is no where I can try in the pipe. The grass itself is at least 70% moss. If I was to put in organic matter would I not have to dig up the grass anyway or would it not be an idea to remove the grass and make the rest of the back yard level with the pathway or even a little higher. will this help with the drainage or not?

Thanks again to everyone

 

"If you can imagine just how little water a hole filled with rubble will hold, you can begin to understand the problem"

Sorry whis4ey, but that's not my experience.

We are on heavy clay here, and flat - no slope to run a drain to.

We have 300 sq.m. of roof and all the downpipes go to soak-aways, we also have land drains for the front drive and lawn (a similar area). If we get a heavy rain the lower side of the (slightly sloping) drive is under water, but within an hour or two it has gone.

 

" I have looked at doing french draining before but there is no where I can try in the pipe"

Sorry, can you clarify that please?

Paving Expert has useful information on drainage - there is a picture of perforated drainage pipe about half way down.

 

Seeing that I have already had to dig holes to remove my hedge stumps and had to rack away about 18 bags of the type of stones people use on driveways I will give it a shot. Any idea on the depth of hole I need to dig. I was thinking 2.5 feet with 0.5 feet gravel fill and back fill with top soil.

Cheers

 

There are formulae on the Paving Expert site for size fo soakway based on the area to be drained, and how much rain you think you might get

http://www.pavingexpert.com/drain08.html

 

Thanks for the link Kristen
When I was looking into this a few months back some of the websites used the term French drainage for when you use a perforated drainage pipe at or near the bottom of you trench like you explained first. It was a wee while ago so I maybe completely wrong, sorry if I am.

cheers

 

Thank you :thmb: for that will have a betta read when I get these stumps and roats out.

enjoy

 

My understanding of a French Drain is a trench with gravel but without any pipe in it. All the pipe really does is to make a "bigger gap" between the stones - the water doesn't have to flow INSIDE the pipe,. it can go in, back out, back in again ... its just a nice large hollow through the stones.

But I've not hard other people referring to a French Drain the way I think of it, so its probably open to interpretation and means different things around the country (or, if not, it means different things to different people within about one metre of MY house!!)