gardening

[zeta]

I have a water logged lawn and need to use drainage.The soil is high clay content so over the years of kids tec on it it has compacted now when it rains it is like a swimming pool.I am willing to start from sctrach and completly rotivate etc but how do I put in soakaways and will this make a difference.

[Maria Hopewe]

If you have use of a decent rotivator, one of the ways to tackle this is to rotivate in equal parts of peat and sand and work in well. This will break down the clay and help your drainage.

[WendyS]

If you have heavy clay soil, the only long term solution may be to dig a number of channels about a foot wide and 18" to 2 feet deep across your lawn and put down a thick layer of rubble, broken bricks etc. for soakaways. then rotivate the whole area, mixing in plenty of sand. This is a fairly drastic & time consuming solution and if you can't face this, the only short term solution would be to use a garden fork to make deep aeration holes every 12 inches over the whole of your lawn and brush a layer of sand over the lawn's surface so that a lot of it goes into the holes. if you adopt this latter course, I suggest you first give your lawn a thorough raking to remove any moss and mow it lightly as soon as it is dry enough to walk on. this will encourage the surface area to dry out more quickly and hopefully make the aeration holes work more effectively.

[kwicky]

WendyS answer seems quite comprehensive. An alternative would be to have top soil delivered and plant some grass seed. And pray we have no more torrential downpours this year.