Landscape Drainage Solutions

If your front yard is full of stagnant, standing water, you need a good drainage method to get rid of it. Finding an effective solution is vital not only from an aesthetic point of view, but also from the practical view of protecting your home from flooding.

This is more important if you live in a place that regularly experiences heavy rainfall and/or flooding. Built up water can cause extensive structural damage to your house, and can also suffocate any plants that may become submerged. Whether you are encountering soil erosion or water pooling in the garden, there is a solution for these problems.

Poor drainage in landscaped gardens is one of the biggest problems that most homeowners face. It destroys most plants, and also poses a health hazard to the human inhabitants, by becoming a breeding ground for various pests, such as mosquitoes. Here are some ways to correct the situation.

Installing a dry creek bed is one of the simplest solutions. A dry creek bed is a drain that is wider than it is deep, and is layered with small rocks. It entails quite a bit of digging, but the project is easy enough for a home gardener to undertake. First, you need to figure out the course of the creek.

The water that will flow through the dry creek will have to drain somewhere. Most people redirect the water onto the street. But this is not such a good idea, as you may face problems with the local authorities. The best thing to do is to dig a dry well and redirect the water flowing through the dry creek here.

To install the creek bed, you need to dig up the soil along its course. Next you need to line the trench with landscape fabric along its entire length. Apply mortar over a section of the landscape fabric, and place the rocks over it.

Sometimes the problems can be solved by improving the quality of the soil. Many times the soil is too compacted and has a high capacity for water retention, which makes for poor soil drainage. This is more likely in cases of clay soil. Clay is very dense, and as such, does not allow water to percolate through it.

A good drainage solution for yards is installing a French drain. A French drain is an underground drain covered with gravel. It is usually 1-2 feet deep. To install a French drain in your yard, you need to first mark a straight course through your yard, dig up the soil to create a deep trench at least one foot deep.

Line the trench with landscape fabric, making sure that there is enough fabric to cover the trench from top. Next, line half the depth of the trench with coarse gravel, and wrap the ends of the fabric over it. Add a layer of sand and top soil over the gravel.

You can also consider other drainage solutions, such as installing a sump pump or a dry well. While installing any system in your landscaped garden or yard, make sure you channel the water to a dry well or municipal drains.