Save Your Yard & Foundation With a Dry Well
3 Materials
$230
2 Days
Easy
Nothing glamorous, you can't even see it when it's done, but a dry well is a great way to redirect water in your yard.
Luckily for us, the house we bought turns out to have the lowest backyard on the block. Or so it seems to us. When it downpours, we get standing water. Deep water. Like take off your shoes, roll up your pants water.
After doing some research online, which is very important to do as you do not want to redirect water into places that are even worse, water can be insidious, we opted to dig a dry well. It's essentially a big pit filled with gravel.
I kid you not, this is what we found underground. Uh huh. Nothing like urban neglect.
Anyway. We dug ours 4' x 4' x 36" deep. And wow, next time we will hire people. Wow. It hurt.
Once you've finally finally made it and can't move, line the hole with landscape cloth. This keeps dirt from seeping back into the hole and ruining the whole darn thing.
Next, fill it up with gravel. Just plain ol' nothin' fancy gravel. We had two cubic yards delivered based on the size of our pit to China.
Now, we're not done yet but here it is filled. Suggestions include leaving 6-8" of space between the surface and the gravel but we didn't. Our gravel came with loads of fine grains so we're waiting for it to settle a bit. We can always remove gravel if need be. Next steps are to cover the gravel with sand then replace the grass.
Want more details about this and other DIY projects? Check out my blog post!
Comments
Join the conversation
4 of 109 comments
-
The back flow valves are expensive and they clog up and cause even more trouble! Unfortunately we know this first hand! My husband and son won’t be happy with all the digging but this sounds like a great option for us!! Thank you!
-
Indeed, back flow valves are very expensive. I didn’t know though that they can clog, thanks for that info. Great, I hope this project helps you! Thanks!
-
-
You would get more leaching back into the ground with washed stone. That means no fines. I would put a mixture of M89 and 57 stones. They are just 2 different sizes. Make sure to cover the top with fabric to keep soil out. Replant grass and add soil after natural compaction.
-
Thanks for the tips!
-
Frequently asked questions
Have a question about this project?
How’s this working today and is there anything you’d do differently
This is one type of containment system I am debating. The other is using NDP plastic fill landscape wrapped tubes 15 inch diameter, sunk vertically in our low spot area. Four or six of these, drilled down about 5 feet with 6-12 sand, soil, and sod or grass seed. Anyone tried this? Thanks.