The water got higher and much wider than this, several times this year.

My beautiful constructed waterway has to be destructed and enlarged greatly. Our first move is to beg the city to put an inlet in to hold the water that is illegally being dumped into common areas and moves into our property. They also need to dig up the old drain pipes and enlarge them all (that black circle has a city drain in it). If that fails we have to enlarge the whole waterway greatly and eventually do our own work to the drains once we can be incognito.

So no planting for a long time. My poor shrubs and trees sitting here waiting for a home. Before September and we decided to play Noah, the water way was working like a charm and it all seemed like we were ready to get to work planting. It is frustrating! I'm so READY to get back and side yards. I can not even do the side as wished (and boy, I'd begun by having HUGE pieces of concrete installed for circular walkway.

Where on earth we find the funds to get this job done, I don't know....

GGG

Good lord, that is a lot of water. Way more than I've ever had to deal with. The rain has been exceptional this winter, but you never know when this might happen again.

GGG

Annette

Nancy.

Sorry for this mess you've got. We had dig out drains deeper at the top of our meadow garden - lay perforated pipe (in a sock), cover with gravel, and will dress it up with nicer gravel on top of that. We, of course, routed the pipe and gravel trenches to the dry stream/rain garden. We finished it just before the snow, melt and 2" of rain this last week -- it worked!

Why do we have so much runoff? Our neighborhood road is a private road and has no ditches. We're downhill.

Cameron

k

I hope your landscape designer friend comes up with some good ideas for your yard. I'm sure this will look much better when the rain eases and there's less flooding. And another thing....we all know how hard you work on your yard and garden and I'm sure your husband does too. This will all work out and we are all here for you anytime you need a friend. I wish you were closer, I'd have you over for a nice pot of tea...or whatever beverage you prefer :)

Take care,
Cameron

Today I decided to take control of what I could and caulked the "tower" again. I think it is settling a lot from all the rains. Then I went around the circumference of that side of the house and used cement caulk where the walkways and foundations are opening up a bit. My landscape friend had part of his beautiful little house sink 5" last week! I'll see if that helps keep water out. We are in for more tomorrow.
The arborist came today. Root rot tests done very soon will help us determine if the trees are having a problem, and also they are testing the soil. He said the trees are probably pretty happy now but struggling a bit to adapt.
Today the man I want to speak to at the city finally got the message and I can call him tomorrow!!! This man has been out before and some friends had him at their place a few weeks ago and said he seemed genuine. So he's my best first shot and I'll see how it goes.
Tomorrow in the rain I will go out and take photos of the water draining from people's properties into the "common area" - it doesn't matter what area it is, it is supposed to be against the rules if they are consciously doing it (with drainage tubes etc). Most of my immediate neighbors have not done that, but I get water from so far, that immediate neighbors are not the sole concern.
I also have questions for the city arborist and am going to book a chat. When they build a new house here they get permission to rip out all the trees. Homeowners can't do that. It's actually difficult for a homeowner to get a removal permit. However builders can remove healthy trees "in the way" or where they want to lay sod and not have to replace the trees. Average Joe's must replace trees.
The arborist said a tree drinks 100 gallons of water a day. That would surely help. Before the tornado we were forested here. Now folks are afraid of the trees.

When I moved to my new place, I realized in the following spring that all the spring rains and snow melt pooled into my area. The city drain is located in my neighbor's side but for some reason possible due to the land settling and the property was old, the channel created for the water wasn't draining out properly. So I hired a landscaper to dig down a trench with a perforated pipes. This trench was coverd up with pebbles to resemble a dry river bed. The pipes led to my neighbor's drain so when water drained down to my area, it's immediately released into the drain.

I also created a hill of sorts to block off the water from the neighbors and to help channel their water into the drain in my neighbors side. That 'hill' I planted with my shrubs and perennials that could withstand the moisture.

The rain water that drenched my area came from my neighbor's gutters and their backyards were elevated higher than ours so it was only a natural thing for the water to course through my yard but it wasn't meant to remain there. I had such soggy soil, not to mention pools for mosquitos to lay their eggs.