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This ivy not only creates a green space but helps with water flow on a wall.
This ivy not only creates a green space but helps with water flow on a wall.
Question: How can I help prevent water damage to my land and to my larger community's watershed?
Answer: Through research, we can find ways to help prevent the sweeping away of soil and pollutants. And, if we try to manage our water retention or plan for clean run-off, we can do our part in a global community.
First, more about erosion--the washing away of (vast) amounts of soil by water (Coblenz, 1997). Dr. Oldham says that this happens to some degree nearly everywhere. Although wind erosion has been a problem in the Delta and in uninhabited areas of the Arctic, water erosion occurs where "vegetation, structures, or ground covers don't reduce water's energy."
Dr. Nagel adds that prevention means not letting raindrops touch bare ground; with any loss of grass coverings, soil will be lost. Since water rushing through ditches will cut into the soil, prevention can include cement, stones, or hard surfaces to slow forceful rooftop water. With that energy reduced, water can flow over a lawn without moving soil (Coblenz).
Nagel's study shows that during a major rain, in construction areas, bare slopes can lose as much as three inches of topsoil; so, that soil is often scraped away and set aside to spread later. State and federal laws mandate using silt fences to catch remaining topsoil. Then, grass is seeded in an area and covered with straw, cloth, or hydromulch--seed mixed with wood pulp and water and sprayed over the area (Coblenz).
Because of established plants, soil erosion is less problematic in gardens that have exposed bare ground and loosened soil. There can be soil loss, however, across other deluged landscapes. So, what does another field study show?
The gestalt gardener Felder Rushing suggests in his Daily Journal column (February 2022) that terraces may work well--one or more landscape areas higher than others are separated with a slope or a wall. To help soil loss in large areas, he suggests a possible combination swale and berm. The swale is ditch-like, but wide and shallow and possibly mow-able, several feet or yards wide and just a few inches deep in the center. The berg is a low, wide, built-up area, maybe created from the small amount of dirt dug from a swale. Most of us have seen swales created with landscape fabric and flat rocks--temporary "dry creek" waterways. Additionally, Rushing suggests a possible rain garden--a shallow, dry pond where water can settle for a few days with attractive "ditch" plants to tolerate wet and dry periods (a list of such plants is available at msucares.com). He then suggests a fourth possibility of plants like liriope, ivy, Asiatic jasmine and other evergreen groundcovers to stop erosion around these additions.
Installing a French drain might be an option to move standing water that can lead to turf diseases, mold, or wood rot. Water will naturally drain from yards with this installation. Basically, "you will need a 4-inch drainage pipe with a sock cover, pea gravel, a shovel, and a string level (with string)." MSU's Smart Landscapes' experts Brzuszek, Drackett, and E. Smith may be your best sources for this drain, along with Extension Publication 2146, "Water Conservation in Your Landscape."
Dr. Beth Baker, MSU Extension Service, writes about what happens with any community water runoff downstream. That surface water, not contained, flows into larger water bodies. There are ways to protect these nested community watersheds--natural boundaries where water drains. They may encompass a few acres or thousands of square miles.
Think of the effects of moving water from our town to our countryside. We all live in this watershed: the Mississippi River Basin--stretching "as far west as Montana, as far north as Minnesota, and as far east as Pennsylvania...with all land use practices traveling to pollute the Gulf of Mexico. Some land waters contribute to "an annual hypoxic zone that threatens our coastal fisheries industry (Baker)."
What can we do? Change. Even use a broom to clean a driveway so that oil, dirt and other contaminants aren't hosed down storm drains. Carefully dispose of chemicals and oil; use chemicals and fertilizers sparingly, and follow label instructions on insecticides. Lastly, remember to check your septic systems--and to pick up pet waste (Baker).
Now, when we watch the news showing water rushing through Montana and Yellowstone Park (part of our own watershed), we can try to understand where our water comes from and where it goes. Water connects each of us here on a global scale.
From this town and this area--
Growing up, we heard dinner-table talk about water moving across Aunt Bea's backyard from her neighbor's slightly higher ground. Her ivy fence helped some, but she told of other measures taken to prevent any soil loss to her garden. We listened without realizing any universality.
Once, Kristin, just in from an elementary class with a forward-thinking teacher, pointed to a plastic, ringed soda carrier and generalized a warning, still imminent: "Marine scientists found 18 tons of plastic on Henderson Island, an uninhabited island in the South Pacific (Baker)."
One writing student in Oxford in a food-themed class chose his aunt's water shortage in California for an argument paper. “Hopefully, he learned some answers to questions “Why? and “What can I do?”
(Visit the MSU Extension Service and Mississippi Water Resources Research Institute websites for more on watershed stewardship.)
Betty Crane, Ph.D., is a trained volunteer with the Mississippi State University Extension Service. Have a question for the Pontotoc Master Gardeners? Visit the Pontotoc Extension office or call 662-489-3911.
Sunny. Near record high temperatures. High 97F. Winds light and variable..
A clear sky. Low 73F. Winds light and variable.
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