On 03/12/16 13:20, rick wrote:
I have very bad ground .... it was a selfbuild site that was land built
up by over 20' back in 30's to become a railway sidings .... what they
built it up with is steel works slag & subsoil from nearby A road they
were digging through a hill.
Disused since 60's it became a SelfBuild site.

For my main veg plots I built up high raised beds and imported soil ...
and over a couple of years with loads of manure & sharp sand have got
this to good condition and very fertile.
But for borders and ground level beds ... although I dug out the 'sub
soil' to a depth of 24' and put in imported soil it is very heavy - with
high clay content, gets waterlogged.

Due to established plants SWMBO won't let me Rotavate it so mass
addition of anything is not an option.
I have come up with a plan B

I bought a hand operated 4" diameter Auger ... and have the idea that
every 2' or so will bore put a 4" hole around 2' deep and fill it with
sharp sand ... and top the last 2" with good loam.
Physically tried it and it bores the holes easily.
My thought being 2 fold ... vertical drainage will allow (by
hydrostatic pressure) water to seep into the sand filled 'tubes' and
help drain the ground.
and secondly over time the sand will mix in with soil by worm action
etc. ,,, and improve the soil.

Anybody see any issues with this €¦. And maybe any improvement €¦. maybe
something other than just sharp sand into the holes ?



This sort of works.

In my case where I had waterlogged clay, I added limestone road bed
material, and the grass then grew on top, whilst the water flowed through it

The farm around me is done very very carefully, and features fixed
porous land drains at serious subsoil depths, criss crossed by a mole
ploughed herringbone pattern that is higher up, and is refreshed every
few years.

That's how you REALLY mange waterloging.

So in principle, you need drainage channels of some sort to carry excess
water away, and you need ways to get any surface water to those channels
effectively. Just raising the surface of course works - the water will
flow *under* the flowerbeds instead of through...

But if you want to really drain an area, you need to set up proper
drainage of some sort. Wherever the water naturally drains TO, you need
to build a system that will get it there faster, and that mains digging
down into the subsoil and creating underground water channels, either of
pipes or of porous material.

And that's why your vertical bores will only sort of work., They will
act as sumps, they will carry surface water undergruund BUT unless they
penetrate to an effective drain or aquifer, they wont ultimately get rid
of the water.

What WILL works is a trench around the area you want to drain filled
with a porous pipe bedded in pea shingle, and back filled. And that pipe
must flow down to a soakaway elsewere or a ditch, or whatever is the
local drainage system

I have used a pond for this. Bloody great hole, into which pipe flows.

But that was on sloping land.

Oh, a weeping willow will dry an area of soil about 2/3rds of its
height, and they grow fast.



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