Garden Drainage
TomosRoberts
Posts: 2
Hi
I am seeking some advice regarding drainage on our lawn.
The garden is predominantly flat, previous owners had converted then garden (grass) into all landscaped, so we had a local tradesman who had done other work for us (carpenter by trade but very good in the garden generally) dig all the concrete up. We laid a lawn down, however as this was done in July time, and the previous soil had been under alot of heavy concrete for some time, i dont think he properly loosened the ground before laying the fresh soil and then turf. Unfortunately we have not had kind winters yet (last 3 years) and had a lot of rain, and we find parts of the garden just gets waterlogged.
For the last two years i have been using a plug aerator, which seems to have slightly improved how the garden deals with alot of water, however its clearly not enough and come Spring again i can see me having to put more seed down on areas which have turned to muck over the winter.
Without digging the whole garden up starting again ensuring drainage is in place, is there any smaller options i could try first? I was thinking of trying to fix "patches" with adding a volume of sand into the ground, or alternatively find some sort of extra long aerator to create very deep drainage holes.
Any suggestions welcome,
Thanks
Posts
you can regularly top dress with thin layer of fine sand (once a week or more often if you can) during the summer lawn growing season, after a few years you end up with a top layer of well draining sandy soil, golf courses and bowling greens use this technique for the fine grass areas.
you can also use a garden fork to aerate as the hole you make are far deeper than any hollow tube aereator i can think of.
but by the sounds of it you have compacted heavy clay like soils under the ground so land drains (plastic or french) might be you best bet, if you can run it into a low spot (or make a low spot) you can do bog gardening very well in that area.
Thank you for the reply, if i looked to start placing some of this clay soil (essentially digging it up) and replacing with fresh soil - should i look at add sand to the mix? and if so, what sort of ratio (soil to sand) would you look at?
I wouldn't add sand to the soil mix as it doesn't blend well with clay. It's better to add organic soil improver, leaf mould etc. Try and do this iver as large an area as you can, get a skip to get rid of the clay and get bags of topsoil in.
use sharp sand, not builders or soft sand as it doesn't help with drainage, you can also add horticultural grit or gravel to the mix to help with the drainage