Hi everyone,

This is my first post here on this forum and I'm hoping someone here can help me.

A friend of mine has a very wet area in her yard. It currently has somewhat of a lawn, and lots of jewelweed. Most months of the year there is standing water over a large part of it (about two inches deep), even in the drought-like conditions we had here this year.

My friend wants to put a naturalized swamp/bog-type garden here, since her lawn service leaves ruts in the area (personally I'm surprised the mower doesn't get stuck!) We've done and are still doing some research and have a plant list started.

My question is, how do we go about the actual planting? Should we amend the soil? Is it even possible to amend the soil in these conditions? We don't want to "fill" the area, but rather work with it as is. Also, every step I take there I just sink, and I worry about compaction and possibly damaging the soil, but I'm not sure how else to go about this. I'm a bit hesitant to start because I'm not sure how to!

Any suggestions or advice? Thanks so much!

Dee