SiLOSSiLOS

Make your yard drainage look planned

About this photo
‹ Back
shingle

1Rain chains instead of a pipe

A chain hangs where the downspout was, and the water slides down it link by link into a basin of river rock. It sounds like a creek and looks like jewelry. It moves less water than a big pipe in a real gully-washer, so it suits a porch roof or a corner that never gets the worst of it.

2The dry creek bed

Dig a shallow swale where the water already wants to go, line it with landscape fabric, then fill it with stones from pebbles to boulders, mixed like nature got lazy. Curve it through the yard instead of running it straight. In a storm it carries water; in September it carries the eye.

3Splash blocks with a personality

The plastic splash block from the hardware store works fine and looks like a plastic splash block. A carved stone one, a shallow dish of gravel, or a flat rock the size of a cutting board does the same job and reads as a choice. Set it so the water lands on stone, not dirt.

4Bury the ugly part

A buried pipe with a pop-up emitter moves water across the yard and vanishes. The only visible piece is a small green dome in the lawn that pops open under pressure and lets the water out downhill. Mow right over it. Nobody at the cookout will know where the rain goes, and you can tell them or not.

5

5A rain garden at the end of the line

Pick the low spot, dig it a foot deeper, and plant it with things that like wet feet then dry spells, like iris, switchgrass, and Joe Pye weed. It drinks the runoff from a downspout and turns it into flowers and butterflies. It is a puddle with a career.

Explore this area
HomeHouseGardenFarm