"Will planting these areas actually help soak up the standing water, or will they just become swampy areas containing plants? "

That's a hard question to answer via computer .. I have dealt with these situations often they could be easy to fix or very difficult.

If you want to dry things up then the math is quite simple .. reduce the water coming in and /or increase the water going out. Simple on paper not always simple in reality.

What is the source of the water ?

OK .. sounds like local rain BUT could be in addition groundwater from your entire neighborhood ending up in your yard. That's a lot of water to move. In theory plants can use some of the water but I don't think they will remove enough of the water and that's if they can live in such conditions.

Raising the grade is another option but ground water can move up into a soil via capillary action so you may be surprised to find you still have wet soil.

Have you dug holes in the dry season ?

So .. get a professional to visit the site and find out what is indeed going on. Most likely a drainage system .. plantings and working the grade will all factor in to the solution. Amending the soil may also be needed to lighten up the soil.

Good Day ...

MK,
This is a low lying property, not the lowest in the neighborhood, but one of them. I agree that the recent rains we've had have raised the overall ground water level which certainly comes mostly from the higher properties beside and behind ours.

I don't think this a case where drainage systems would work unless they included some type of pumping mechanism because there is really no-place within our property that falls below this area's grade to divert the water .

During the construction of our home, the state fined our builder for violating wetlands protection laws. They stopped short of actually declaring this area wetlands, but rather fined him for failing to have a definative analysis done before excavating.

Now remember that the Corps of Engineers defines a "wetland" as any area that holds water for any period of time. In this case most of the year there are no puddles and the ground is quite dry. Still, right now it would meet the qualifications.

"Have you dug holes in the dry season ?"
Well, yes and no. DH dug the bird-feeder hole in the summer when we had had no rain for weeks. On the other hand, this part of North Carolina really doesn't have very "cut-and-dry" dry seasons. It can be rainy at any time or we can experience droughts (as we did this past summer).

Ammending the soil might be a good place to start. These puddles are only an inch-or-so deep and tend to go away in three or four days on their own. Maybe adding something to our clay would help the water to soak in better (and faster).

On the other hand, I have thought of these areas as natural "raingardens" since they slow the runnoff of water into a nearby drainage easement. For that reason I was hoping to use plantings (rather than DH's plans for more lawn) to encourage the slower ground percolation yet to also keep these areas from being a total muddy mess. How much water can I reasonably expect plants to suck-up?

Thoughts?

.....Jan

Wetlands are defined by topography. Soil won't fix your topography, just make mud. If you turn the area into a wetland meadow, it will still be wet but you won't be trying to mow or walk back there. I personally think wetland meadows and wetland plants are gorgeous, so my solution would be to work with the land. But, at any rate, you'd have to have a big earth mover in there to change the topography for the "soil" option to work.

There are a lot of different types of wetlands. There are also a lot of different situations that cause saturated soil. It could be a high water table, or a perched water table. It could be due to the isolated condition of the grading in the area, or it could be the overal water table of the bigger area.

If this wet condition has a very long history, the soil color will tend to be grey or whitish rather than red or orangy. What color have you and DH encountered?

The neighbors say that our builder dumped many, many trucks of fill dirt on the front part of our property to build it up for our home's foundation, but in the back it appears to have been left at the original grade.

The back yard is brownish/reddish/black clay soil. There are also some scattered smallish veins that are more sandy.

...Jan

If it dries out after a couple of days, lawn will work fine. More accurately, probably, mowing the green stuff that happens to grow there will work fine. I sometimes think half of my side yard is really carex.

I haven't at all been able to figure out how to garden in a swamp. Part of it is that as a natural, established swamp, I've got all the native thugs already there. Part of it is that anything like normal digging is impossible due to the soil always being wet. Part of it is that establishing plants, even wetlands plants, hasn't been easy. There is no dry season down there. Once upon a time, trees tried growing there, but they have been dead for years, and almost all of them have fallen down now.

BTW, the soil down there is distinctly blue.

Thanks for your input Mad. The pictures of your property on your webpage look great. (but cold this time of year).

What we have is definately not "swamp" and we have always been willing to define anything green that we mow with the lawnmower as "lawn" (LOL)

Without any strong arguments against it, DH will raise the grade with some imported soil and plant grass. Time will tell if this works or shifts the problem areas somewhere else.

....Jan

You could try something large, like a bald cypress. They use a lot of water, but also tolerate drier conditions. And they are native to the southeast. I know of one former wet spot that now needs irrigation as the trees have grown. They're not as trashy as willows, and rarely fall down in hurricanes. Plus they are beautiful.

Thanks creatrix. They are on my list of native trees for rain gardens. Glad to hear that they drink-up their share of water.

Much as I loved the weeping willow we had when I was a child, I've read that they are problematic, so I'll stay clear of them.

.......Jan

You might want to check with your local municipality on changing the grade of your yard, especially in respect to redirecting any water. You might be able to do it without them knowing, but if you push that water off on someone else, they might complain. Just something to consider

Curly willow (salix matsudana) and pussy willow (salix discolor) would be good in that area--Id on'tthink they have the same invasive root issues as salix babylonica--but it would be wise to check. And think how nice it would be to harvest and dry your own pussy willows and curly willow!

melanie

I hope you havn't filled in your problem yet, it is a great gardening opportunity. I built a rain garden/bog at my last house because of gutter runoff and erosion in the neighbor's yard. I dug two feet down and installed a liner, replaced the soil with peat and clay from the hole and then planted. It was lovely! The plants were happy and lush and the erosion stopped. The plants and mulch sucked up the extra moisture and even after a heavy downpour, there was no surface water after two hours (no mosquitos.) Your yard probably doesn't need a liner, just surface ammendment and plants. Once you see the butterflies on buttonbush or asclepias incarnata, you'll be hooked on soggy soil.

I planted a Japanese Pagoda tree sapling in early summer 2005 in my backyard as a shade tree. It grew from about 6 feet & is now about 10' high (and only about 2 - 3 inches in diameter) Last summer it was quite nice. It started to bud this past March with some tender green shoots. Unfortunately, we had a few nights of a hard freeze (in the 20s) & then back up to the normal range in the 40s & 50s since. Subsequently, the shoots have turned brown and crumbly. It has stopped sprouting. This is the first tree I've planted and am unsure what to do. will it revive?
thanks for your thoughts ahead of time.

magadlk...

Give it a few more weeks. We had a lot of things get "bitten" down here in NC (we are calling it "The Big Easter Freeze") and some trees (well, the crape myrtles) are just NOW starting to re-leaf.

melanie

It IS a wetlands as defined by federal law and I'm surprised the feds didn't go after your builder. You are safer planting a wetland garden type area.

Ziggy

Here is a link that might be useful: USACE Jurisdictional Wetlands Manual

Magaldk, why on earth did you stick this question onto a totally unrelated thread started by someone else? You're welcome to start a new thread any time - though you should perhaps be in the trees forum for that one.

KarinL