What will i do with my swamp garden?

shinsull

I live in a housing estate with semi detached houses, got the usual back garden attached to those type of houses, patio paving on one side and grass on the other.

We used to get a swimming pool out the garden when it rained so got a gardener in last year to sort out the drainage. He put a french drain around the grass to stop it from getting onto the patio but the grass is still very bad. There doesnt seem to be once bad spot,it seems like all the grass is mulch.

I want to make it usable because at the moment if we sit on our lounge chairs in the grass they sink all the way down.

Got quoted to just get it leveled out and concrete in but its just too expensive right now. So i want to do a diy job on it and do bits as we have the money.

So my question is,what can i do to the grass area that can be done cheap.
Dig up top layer of grass,lay sand to absorb the water then lay stones or something? I really dont know and would love some advice on what id have to do that i can do it myself.

Thanks

Calahonda52

messing around with sand etc is a waste of time.

Just guessing at your set up:
What I have done in the past with problems like this is dig a soak hole all the way across the back of the house, along the path if there is one.
This might be a metre wide and a metre deep, depending on the scale of the problem.
This is filled with crushed rock, no fines, and covered with water permeable membrane and replace grass.
Included in the above is a 9" or 12 " wide sump, made from land drainage pipe, all the way down with a concrete base, and a secure manhole type cover
Then if the going gets really bad and the soak hole is full, you reach for your Lidl or Aldi submersible pump, pop it down the sump and pump the water out into your surface water drainage system, or else out through the garage and onto the road.

I have two clients where the pump has a flow switch and are permanently armed as the flooding from GAA pitches behind can be very rapid.

RobAMerc

great post Calahonda52

I am sort of in a similar position but had considered hiring a fence post digger and digging a bunch of holes around the whole garden and filling them with crushed rock.

Would this be an option do you think ?

I know you'd never get the same volume as what you are suggesting but mine is in no way bad enough to worry about pumping out.

Cantona's Collars

I had a very wet garden,I put down weedblock fabric(the heavy duty stuff) and covered it with about 3 inches of quarry dust which is cheap as chips per tonne.Then I levelled it and covered it with artificial turf which was the most expensive bit but now I no longer have a bog for a garden.It can rain as much as it wants and it just soaks away.
If you didn't want the expense of the artificial turf then use some nice stone.

Right2Write

OP, where does this water come from that is flooding your garden? Unless the natural drainage is awful and the houses are built on a bog, normal rain should just soak away naturally. What are your neighbour's gardens like? Have they taken remedial work and shifting the water onto you? If you get your ground drained, are you shifting the problem next door etc?

Cantona's Collars

Generally if you dig down about 4 inches in your typical housing estate garden you'll find a hardpan left by construction equipment and god knows what buried in it.I dug lumps of concrete, blocks, timber,you name it out of mine and the ground was like concrete, water has no chance to drain away.

Thibus

I had something similar, new build and a swamp that took weeks to dry out after any downpour. I spent the last 3 weekends working on it. Dug it all up, down to between 2 and 3 foot, let it dry out levelled and reserved. Saw an immediate improvement in drainage, now am just waiting for the grass to grow from seed