The area is about 30 feet long, 15 feet wide. The front area is a bit higher than the back. I don't have a lot of room to build the front up as the soil is already at the level of the sidewalk. The sidewalk goes around our pool so it does need to look nice and soil needs to be contained so as not to escape into the swimming pool. Soil is heavy clay without any rocks at all except for escapes from the rest of the yard which has been "xeriscaped" but natural soil here has no rocks, not even a pebble. Very fine clay with only the organic material that I've added prior to this spring's planting. I will of course continue adding tons of organic matter. I've added store-bought compost, worm compost and alfalfa pellets so far. I think I used about 1,000 lbs of compost, 360 lbs of alfalfa pellets and about 50 lbs of vermicompost. Our soil is very alkaline and I have to add frequent iron supplements because of this due to chlorosis symptoms with my peppers, beans and almost everything else that I've grown in my other areas of the yard. The backside of the garden (lower edge) has a very, very old weathered border of railroad ties that I could build up the soil to which would probably give me about 8 more inches than I'm already at. This would probably level out the garden from the slight hill that it's on right now. I'm thinking that I may need to have an irrigation expert come look at the huge irrigation gate (big pipe) and see if there is a type of fitting to run a soft hose to and divert water to the front yard. Perhaps I can start a bermuda grass lawn in front. This could solve the problem completely. French drain plus berm may be a temporary solution. Have a person coming out in about a week or so to dig a hole for a 500 gallon propane tank. Will see about putting the dirt along the back edge as a berm. Then, will get some good garden soil delivered to build up the backside of the garden. Any idea how many cubic yards of soil I should have delivered?

I wasn't sure from the first picture, but the close-up helps a lot. This is one of the mallows. Probably common mallow, but there are other flowering varieties that can seed in from the neighborhood. I would get it out of there now, before it has a chance to set seed. And it is undoubtedly pretty deeply rooted. Don't try to pull it. Dig it out.

Most of these plants are technically what I'd call 'wet meadow' plants. Any normal soil with a relative amount of moisture should work. Most can survive temporary drought and ordinary garden conditions. For example, I grow Ironweed on a dry hillside with few problems. Conversely, most handle temporary flooding well too. Now if you if you are looking for true peat bog plants and shrubs, I'd look at things instead like leatherleaf, laborador tea, swamp azalea, and bog rosemary. There's a nursery in NJ, Rare Find, that has many of these sorts of things, although he may not always list them in the catalogue. Evermay in Maine has a few good bog shrubs too. Here is a link that might be useful: Rare Find

Hi Scott, You have an excellent plan! It's likely that your plan is going to set a standard for similar sized gardens in your town. It's a real quality design. The developer did a great job. As for plants, I'll give you a few native plant ideas. Native Grasses: Little Bluestem, Schizachyrium scoparium. Nice clump forming grass that grows to 3 feet tall. Pretty orange gold cast to the stems in fall. Good winter interest. Prairie Dropseed, Sporobolus heterolepis. Short round clump forming grass, maybe 1 foot tall. The tiny grass flowers smell like pop corn when they bloom in summer. Attractive low grow grass. Native Forbs: Swamp Milkweed, Asclepias incarnata. Showy reddish pink blooms that attract Monarch butterflies. Can be challenging to establish. It loves wet soil. Blue Wild Indigo, Baptisia australis. Showy bluish purple spikes in late spring. Creates a round bushy 3 to 4 foot tall planting (after 3 years). Attractive leaves. Eastern Purple Coneflower, Echinacea purpurea. Excellent flower color and upright habit. Attracts American Goldfinches to eat the seeds. Maybe 3 feet tall. Prairie Smoke, Geum triflorum. Early spring blooming plant. The attraction is the seed heads, not the flowers. The seed heads produce a wispy pinkish tuft that dances in the wind and resembles fire and smoke on a prairie (well, it kind of looks like smoke). Very short plant that goes well with Prairie Dropseed grass. Hope this helps. Tom