Poor Garden Drainage

Credit-Crunched

Does anyone have any suggestions for a grassed garden, that just holds water and becomes sodden very easily.

I've looked at french drains, but don't quite see where they would run off to?

Garage to north, house to south, public road to east, neighbour to west.

Would digging it all up and adding a gravel base help, if so how far down would i need to go?

Master_Blaster

Have you got clay soil?

Credit-Crunched

Master_Blaster wrote: »

Have you got clay soil?

Its Pretty heavy, not all clay, but about 80%

Ebe_Scrooge

Credit-Crunched wrote: »

Would digging it all up and adding a gravel base help, if so how far down would i need to go?

Yes it would help, but it's a mammoth job. It depends on what's causing the problem. If the underlying soil is reasonably OK, and it's just got compacted over the years, then going over it with a hollow tine aerator and brushing sand into the holes can help a lot. Worth hiring a motorised one if you've got anything bigger than a handkerchief

If the soil is completely rubbish and solid, then you may have to look at excavating and gravelling, as you suggest.

Probably a good idea to start with is to dig a small but deepish ( say 3 feet ) hole, so that you can see what the soil is like. Also see if the hole fills with water and remains full. If you've got a high water table then you may just be stuck with it.

Furts

An easy way that I have adopted before is to raise the garden by applying a coarse sand/soil layer (sometimes just sand). This acts as a drainage layer on the surface, and the water drains to the surrounding original areas, typically borders.

cyclonebri1

Credit-Crunched wrote: »

I've looked at french drains, but don't quite see where they would run off to?

And that is the issue, unless you can drain the water by gravity you will still have issues.

Yes, raising the problem area on good drainage can work, BUT, that same water will sit under the surface, it needs to drain away.

tanith

My back lawn is very wet in the Winter but is ok in the Summer months, as the others have said if the water table is high there isn't much you can do about it..

marleyboy

I had the same issue with a house I rented once, An easy temporary solution is to dig a trough around the border to act as a makeshift drain.

Alias_Omega

We dug a hole in the garden, it just constantly back filled with water. We then filled it in...

The soil round here is made of Clay, therefore we expect it to be a bit soft under foot when wet. The solution for us would be a French drain, however running into the surface water sewer system...

SailorSam

That sounds like my last house Op. I tried allsorts digging trenches full of gravel; dug a pool at the bottom of the garden. The neighbour one side put new turf down several times, it looked nice for a while but was a waste of time. The neighbour the other side raised his garden and just put flags down. I think all that happend after that was i got his water onto my side. It was very heavy clay and i couldn't see a solution.

moneyistooshorttomention

I'm working on this too. I've stuck in a drain and will see if this helps.

Next up would be dig up my topsoil, put down layer of gravel or something similar about 12" down, replace topsoil.

If I've STILL got a problem, then I am wondering about Hugelkultur raised beds on top of it.

Just working my way through however many steps I have to through the list before something works.