How to Dry a Field

[whstein]

We have a field of about 2 to 21/2 acres that holds small ponds of water through the winter. It dries in the summer - say June through September. I would like to drain it to be drier longer. One suggestion has been to ditch/trench it where the natural drainage channels have formed and to put drain rock and perforated 4" pipe in the ditches and then cover the pipe and drain rock with soil. The field is reasonably level pasture but there is enough slope to drain the field. The soil is black earth and clay - no rocks. My questions:
1. Is the drain rock/perforated pipe proposal a realistic solution?
2. If so, how deep should the ditch/trench be?
3. Anything else I should do or avoid doing if we go this route?
Thanks guys.
Wally Stein

 

[Egon]

Consider using some shallow trenches with very relaxed side slopes that you can drive over.

 

[Craig Clayton]

If water is collecting in the field then it must be in the low spots. That now determined if you were to scrap soil from the field you could fill in the low spots. We all get water puddles in our gravel driveways and when I regrade I fill in the low spots. If you rent a laser tripod rotary level you can find the slope of the field and mark the high and low spots. And by recording the information for future use you could determine trench lines as suggested before.
Craig Clayton

 

[20 20]

I would invest or find a transit level then you could span large areas and be right on the money.

 

[dave1949]

Without a pic this may be way off, but you may be able to rent a grader/land plane that you pull behind a good sized tractor. These will shave off high spots and fill low ones. Since the land plane frame is carried on wheels and quite long, they will form very gentle slopes, you just drive around .

In the permanently wet ground where I came from in Ohio, they run parallel field drainage lines at 50' spacing about 4' deep. They drain into roadside ditches there. These days it is done with a dozer pulling a subsoiler type of slit trencher thing behind it and the drain pipe is fed into the open slit before it falls closed. Lazer guided depth, all automated.
Dave.

 

[charlz]

How high is the water table? Around here they dug massive drainage ditch systems and put drain tile in some fields. You need a place for the water to go. The drainage ditches also eventually fill in with cattails etc. so they are cleaned out periodically with a excavator (ditches are around 12 feet deep or so and drain into creeks).

 

[beenthere]

The cheapest may be to just have the field tiled.
Farmers in the midwest have to do this to get good drainage for crops in many locations and soil conditions.
The tile are put in as dave1949 mentioned.
When I grew up, the ditches for the clay tile were dug by hand with a tiling spade. the short runs would feed into larger tile and eventually into a crick or stream. Now they have machines to do the job much quicker.

Sounds like the soil is such that it retains water, so just sloping the field to smooth the "pot holes" will likely not be enough to do what you want. Both land planing and tiling will cost some money.

 

[rswyan]

Wally,

We have a field of about 2 to 21/2 acres that holds small ponds of water through the winter. It dries in the summer - say June through September.

Right ....

I would like to drain it to be drier longer.

...... this sounds familiar

One suggestion has been to ditch/trench it where the natural drainage channels have formed and to put drain rock and perforated 4" pipe in the ditches and then cover the pipe and drain rock with soil.

Yup - very familiar:

The field is reasonably level pasture but there is enough slope to drain the field. The soil is black earth and clay - no rocks. My questions:
1. Is the drain rock/perforated pipe proposal a realistic solution?

Absolutely, yes.

2. If so, how deep should the ditch/trench be?

Somewhat dependent on the nature of the soil, the lay of the land, and where the eventual outlet will be.

If you have 12" of topsoil thats holding water, and then solid clay below, I'd probably dig out the trench at 18" or 24" (provided I had enough elevation drop to where I was draining to, to make that practical)

In the image above, the steel culvert was joined to plastic line and extended out another 60' or 80' down slope, where it breached the surface and emptied out in my lower front yard.

3. Anything else I should do or avoid doing if we go this route?

Yes - the pipe and drain rock need to be encased in geo-textile filter fabric, to prevent clogging of the drain pipe by the infiltration of fine soil/silt.

The drain rock should be washed gravel or some type of rock with no fines.

Thanks guys.

Hope this helps.

 

[dodge man]

Most field tile in my area that is installed is direct bury. No rock or liner or anything. Just black perforated plastic buried in the ground. The trick is to get enough slope on it that it is self cleaning.

 

[sweettractors]

I would try to use a HD deep penetrating subsoiler first(24-26 inches deep about every 3 ft apart) and if that don't work, go to plan B. Ken Sweet