This is a Run-off Area on One of the Properties I Work For
This was a real mess and not nice to look at , so the owners asked if I could fix this to make it more appealing from the road.. I did my best. Yes it was a lot of work but the bed is now a functional part of the property and looks good too.
Run-off before
side view of before
front view after
side view of after
another view of after.
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Kelly, is this the area where a home may eject water or buried run off from gutters? 1. Did you need to dig down and put weed block material down under the rocks? 2. Did you need to regrade to flow away from the house or main lawn area? 3. I live in the Chicago suburbs (zone 5) and have two areas of water collection and would LOVE to create dry creek beds like this...the easier the better. a. Area 1-my neighbor's house has an ejection area in the back of their yard which flows into mine. It was done before they or I moved here. It is a relatively unused area, but runs near and mainly behind my shed and in the sun. I am not sure how to deal with this. It is primarily a problem in the spring and fall when it rains, so not always wet. Grass grows here, but is it is a soggy area in the spring and fall. b. Area 2-my house ejection area is also in the back of my yard, but is in a mulched area under trees (Shaded) and is on the other side of the yard. Even though it is in a mulched area, it runs toward my main lawn--luckily neither of these are near my house or others. It gathers on my lawn in the the spring and fall when it rains sometimes making a small pond that I have even had ducks swimming in it! The grass has become sparser here, especially after our spring and early summer rains! I know that you cannot see these areas, but was wondering if you had any recommendations for an easy, but pretty fix. I REALLY liked what you did in these photos! Sue
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Hi Sue, This was not a real easy fix but the easiest way to draw the water further down the property. The yard was on a down slope so when we got a lot of rain it would run hard and fast down to this area and pool there. What I did was looked at the area and dug a 2-3 inch trench around the area and placed bigger rocks around it to hold the water back a bit and planted with all water or moisture loving plants, you can see in the photos after I was done that I used River Rock to make a flow pattern and when the water ran it would flow to the river rocks and help keep the hard flow of water back. No I did not use any landscape fabric , it was already there and I essentially took it out , as it served no purpose. The hardest part of this bed was getting all the rock there and placing it. If you can show me a few photos , I may be able to give you a few more ideas to help you as I did one in my own yard as well, that was a nuisance and collected a lot of water right in the middle of the yard. Let me know if I can help you in anyway. Regards, Kelly
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