"The Trench" Managing water coming from a neighboring property.

when we moved to this property several years ago it became evident rather quickly that a neighboring property at the top of the ridge when they had built or had dug upon that instead of using drainage tiles to manage high water they utilized a low point for a emergency overflow it just so happened at that water drained onto our property and when the pond overflowed it the rainwater would saturate the property saturate the lawn and create all sorts of problems so I elected to dig a trench to manage this water I started at the low point of the property where there is a drainage tile that goes underneath the road and started digging up towards the top of the ridge where the pond was when we first moved here I didn't have a whole lot in the way of tools I used my grandfather Spade my dad shovel a handsaw and some machetes there were lots of saplings that had to be cleared before we could even dig and it took the whole project took about two months a couple days off work sometimes working after work and then of course weekends I can't really say for sure how long how long the trench is I've never measured it but we're gonna take a walk along it so you can see for yourself at some point that I was chest deep in what I was digging it was just as I went up the ridge it just became necessary to dig deeper to get to where the hole off the water was I brought the County out to make sure I was doing everything correctly and they just said to make sure I don't get too close to the pond and to make sure that the waterway meandered so without any further ado this we've experiencing right now heavy flooding in our area and so this trench is being put to the ultimate test so I thought it'd be a great opportunity to share with you how it works and how well it's working like I said without any further ado let's go see how things are going and we'll start at the top where the pond is and we'll work our way to the low point here is the emergency overflow for the pond see if I can get up here to where you can actually see the pond I know it's probably pretty loud with the water rushing here there's the pond and there's the emergency overflow and you can see how it used to just drain onto the property and try to find low ground on its own here's where I stop digging and you can see where the water there this is also where the the deepest part of the digging took place where I was pretty far down I'll have to walk alongside here because the trees will be in my way but you kind of get the idea and the Anders down through these saplings which I eventually would like to get cleared out as well this is definitely the most water that it has taken on since I've dug it you see how fast it's moving and as we get further down the trench you'll see the water moving even faster as it takes on more water there's actually a lie that I had to dig for another drainage tile from a different road and when it meets up with that water it really gets cooking here's some of the meandering I mentioned you can see it's quite a bit through here the digging wasn't nearly as deep there was lots of fun things I found along the way large spiders about the big as my palm and lots of crawdads several snakes turtles here's the why where the water comes from another drainage tile I had to dig that all the way to the drainage tile it really was amazing how unmanaged this was I was really surprised but it's something that had to be done it was pretty urgent because this whole area was basically like a swamp before we dug this I'm trying to think it's maybe been six or seven years ago that I dug this so it's really helped to dry things up and before you couldn't even walk out here without sinking it was so swampy of course right now it's pretty soupy just because we've had biblical levels of rain here in East Tennessee the last mile all winter basically but these last few weeks have been pretty brutal now down here it is overflowing normally it meanders and and it follows a certain pattern there but there's so much water that it's overflowing here but it's still going into the underground tile which is great we're not having flooding obviously over the road which is good so there's another drainage tile there getting water from there and then water from over here as well and I'll take you across the road this water is absolutely shooting out the other side and eventually it will find its way to Walden's Creek which is currently overflowed and away it goes so I had help from my wife cutting saplings which was a great help because it was so thick right through here you couldn't even see these trees because the saplings were so dense that's how much clearing took place before we could even start digging but the trench itself is one man one shovel one Spade and a lot of time but pleased with the result and plans for the future is up at the top where the trench begins I plan on bringing in some drainage rock and filling that up and shirin that up really well to prevent erosion so that's gonna be quite a bit of rock and a little bit of a project because I can't get a truck back there so it's gonna probably have to be hauled back there by a wheelbarrow but we'll get it eventually I have to get it done sooner rather than later before I get too old to do it so anyway hope you enjoyed this video sorry if the camera was little bouncy but it's some rough terrain right now and that's my East Tennessee East Tennessee waterway

Channel: Daniel Herber

Views: 560,971

Keywords: Water management, trench, digging, county, water flow, flooding, tile, neighbor, pond, overflow, how to, DIY, East Tennessee, Tennessee, homestead, homesteading

Id: 509EjRkhEJU

Length: 9min 50sec (590 seconds)

Published: Sat Feb 23 2019