Surface Water
Kweegly
Posts: 104
Hi all,
I'm new to gardening as I have just bought my first house. The garden has quite a few trees and an ok sized lawn but any rain at all and the lawn floods. I know the country has had quite the rainfall this year but I had this issue even in the summer months of last year, any rain just turns the lawn into a puddle.
Things I have tried are to fork the lawn heavily, the lawn was quite mossy so I have now removed most of that as well. I even dug a sample hole to see if the soil was clay based but I would say not really. I have attached a picture and marked the areas in red which flood.
Are there any plants or trees I can put in that drink a lot? I would be happy to remove the flower bed under the apple tree and plant something there if it would help?
ow and the sun comes from the left most of the day.
Thanks for any advice.
Posts
No there is a drive and shed, but there might as well be when it rains!
I'm wondering whether there's a blocked land drain or ditch or some other blocked waterway nearby. Have a word with neighbours and see if they can shed any light on the problem. If they have no idea it might be worth consulting a Chartered Land Surveyor.
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
There is a bank at the end of the garden, the garden to the left floods as well but to the right they are fine. I have also notice that the house to the left have raised their garden where we get the worst flooding, maybe they had the same issue. Our garden definitely is the worst though.
Someone at a garden centre mentioned a tree that really drinks a lot of water but I can't remember the name.
Thanks for liking the garden
I'm hoping to do a lot with it, just not sure I'm a complete novice.
Hello Kweegly, you may find that gravel rills, dug through the areas you have marked in red, will run the water to the lowest point where you could have a dewpond. The rills could be decorative channels in a pattern of your design and instead of gravel filler maybe a decorative aggregate. Saw a lovely spiral one once. Sometimes it is best to work with the topography and water table than to fight so you could make the drainage a feature.
The rills are a lovely suggestion by Marinelilium, and may be the best solution. If the house on the left has raised their garden, you might be getting a lot of water pushed in your direction because of that too. Certainly creating better drainage by channeling the water away would be the best solution.
If it was a weeping willow that the GC mentioned - I'd be a bit wary!
I live in west central Scotland - not where that photo is...
Thanx Fairygirl. If I had water available all summer, as Kweegly probably does, I would indulge myself with Zantedeschia aethiopica in rills.....gorgeous!
Oooh that would be lovely
Have always liked them but not sure they'd survive up here. At my last house we had a spring-fed pond with a rill feeding into a smaller one so it would have been perfect, but the bunnies would no doubt have eaten them anyway!
I live in west central Scotland - not where that photo is...
I think I heard that Eucalyptus is a heavy drinker, not sure but I'm sure someone else will help.
Kweegly could have the perfect garden for an astilbe collection too. OK, I am actually a teeny bit jealous of your possibilities now - the grass is definitely greener on your side
Thanks for all the ideas
really like the idea of the rills, I building a path to the back of the garden in the summer and might run rills down the sides.