Waterlogged soil borders, newly landscaped garden

Hi Everyone

I am new to this forum and would value some advice. Ive set the scene of my query below but if you just want to jump to the issue I’m having please go to the Capital letters, the MAIN ISSUE

We moved into a small new build estate with a medium size garden 18 months ago. We did nothing for 12 months to get a feel for the aspect and then took the plunge and got someone in to do the garden. neither of us are now in good health to be able to attempt the work needed.

We noticed that water tended to lay to the one side of the garden and that the lawn dried out in the middle. there were lots of crane fly larvae so some of the issues may have been this. A lot of neighbours have had lawn problems and some on the lower part of the site have had water logging. it’s a semi rural area with a high water table I think there was reference to aquifier area in the planning notes.

We chose to put a pathway where most of the water pooled and had the new lawn area raised on several inches of top soil. The new lawn appears to be ok at the moment but it’s early days, we had 2, 3 and 4 foot borders dug out and top soil put in to a foot, the new top soil looked very good. the guys doing the job said the existing soil was pretty compacted when they were digging out the borders, the top layers didn’t seem too bad so that was a surprise to us.

THE MAIN ISSUE, The job is finished and I’m looking forward to planting in the spring, however, in the last 2 weeks with all the rain in the uk the borders, which are all filled with 12 inches of new topsoil currently have no plants in, appear to be water logging, water is pooling on the top. I hoed the top layers today and some areas are sticky and muddy.

I’m wondering if adding compost or manure will help with drainage or if the compacted soil below top soil is the issue and we should probably had gone with raised beds?

I know the weather has been excessively wet and rainfall heavy but I’m now wondering if we need to do something now so that we can improve? The soil layers when the landscaper guys dug down showed a considerable amount of sand is in there too but further down. No doubt this is builders sand and will present other issues but one thing at a time there was no builders rubble as the site was a field for cattle before but I’m guessing all the compaction is from the building work.

The ‘original’ soil does not have clay, we live on a slight slope but in the middle of the slope so we aren’t at the end of a ‘run’ for water to pool so to speak.

Any advice gratefully received and apologies for the essay

 

Welcome to the forum @Foxglove58 !

I have never had to deal with flooding but I am sure someone else here qith experience will pop on to help you.

 

Thank you CanadianLori, I hope so, just not sure what to do for the best

 

Welcome to the forum @Foxglove58

Is it possible to add a picture of your garden to you reply, just so that we can see what the area looks like?