Polluted runoff in my yard - Help - How do I clean it up?

Discussion in 'Planting, growing, nurturing Plants' started by sherimenelli, Feb 18, 2013.

  1. sherimenelli

    sherimenelli Junior Member

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    My house is situated on a property that is less than a 1/4 acre. I have neighbors on both sides and a large hill 80 by 60 feet that has about a 40 degree slope.

    8 years ago we noticed a lot of water in the edge of our lot at the bottom of the hill in the backyard. It kills a queen palm and many other plants. The builder and city all came out and we foudn out from a geologist that the subdivision was cut out of a hill. The water table has changed.

    I had the water tested several months ago because we thought it might be a spring. The tests showed it had 10 times the nitrates as drinking water and lots of coliform bacteria (however not fecal)

    I'm probably going to test it and the soil again for metals and other polutants.

    We have so much water - he had a 3/4 horsepower pump and it was running 50 minutes of every hour for weeks. We finally gave up. The water is only 2-3 foot underground.

    Right now we have it draining to a drain pipe and going to the street. I'd like to clean the water and use if for the yard (edibles) instead. I live in San Diego where we only get 9 inches a year and I know soon we will have a water crisis in San Diego so having water on my property is like having gold (if it was clean and useable for my edibles).

    I'm thinking about creating a stream that snakes around the backyard. I'd make it a few feet deep I guess. I know I'd probably have to plant sedges and rushes to clean the water as it moved past the plants. At the very end of the stream I would hope I could have clean water that could be pumped to the hill or could be used for a water garden with edibles.

    Help. I need a plan. Will this idea work? How do I implement it. I suppose the first step is to retest the water to figure out what I have as far as pollution. I'm sure all my neighbors have used pesticides. At the end of a stream I can retest to see how clean it is.

    Thanks so much for your ideas and knowledge!

    Sheri

    My question i
     
  2. chook-in-eire

    chook-in-eire Junior Member

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    Hi Sheri,
    I would look at "constructed wetlands" (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constructed_wetlands to get you started). They can be built small or large, single bed, multiple beds in sequence with different wetland plants to deal with different pollutants, vertical flow or horizontal flow. There is a lot of literature about them, both books and online. It takes a good bit of reading and research to "wrap your head around it", to find the right type of construction, dimension, soil matrix and plants for a given situation, climate and throughput. The easiest, but possibly most expensive way would be to find a reputable person or firm to build one for you. Given the impending water crisis in your area you might be able to recoop the cost over time in water savings. Otherwise you'll have to do the reading, planning and construction yourself. It can be done and they do work. However, I'm not sure in how far they deal with pesticides.
    HTH
    Ute
     
  3. sherimenelli

    sherimenelli Junior Member

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    Thanks - I'll look at that!
     
  4. sweetpea

    sweetpea Junior Member

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    sheri, what kind of soil do you have? Is it clay? Is your house downhill from your backyard? Sounds like you might want to capture the water, but if you've got clay, it can get saturated and slide, and even some movement of your foundation would be a disaster. If there is that much water you probably ought to get a soils engineer out there and they can find out if there's bedrock under your house and determine how much water your backyard can safely hold in a snaking kind of "stream"

    In the Middle East they put cisterns under the ground to hold excess water, tanks that can catch it and use it later. When that's full, it could then overflow through pipes to the street. That way the soil isn't affected by the excess water. You might be able to put a series of small tanks that are more shallow that can overflow into each other by gravity flow and not tear up the back yard quite so much.

    Planting trees and shrubs that need a lot of water can help, but they will create shade. But big trees on 1/4 acre would be you'd need to trim them at least once a year.

    Your situation sounds much more complicated, especially since your house needs to be protected :)
     
  5. gardenlen

    gardenlen Group for banned users

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    you could create a pond of sorts and use the water for the garden, just because the water is not drinkable it can go on the garden, don't irrigate just water the root zone areas, a water test only tells you what you have at the time of the test, the next day it could be worse or better.

    but as sweetpea says hey? need wiser selection of land at times. the best would be if you could intercept this water above the house.

    len
     
  6. Pakanohida

    Pakanohida Junior Member

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    Constructed wetlands, 1% diversion if needed, and use plants to clean up the heavy metals. For example, Sunflowers & C. Sativa clean up Cadmium and other heavy metals.
     
  7. Ludi

    Ludi Junior Member

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    They accumulate the heavy metals in their tissues, so unfortunately you have to remove the sunflowers as toxic waste, you can't use them as mulch, for compost, etc. :( I'm not sure what the most responsible thing to do with them would be - burying in an area which will never be used for growing food? Sending to a toxic landfill? :(
     
  8. Pakanohida

    Pakanohida Junior Member

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    With Cadmium, such as the heavy metal from nuclear waste, yes the plants are removed, treated in piles with a special bacteria, and then incinerated safely. Yes, plants accumulate metals & other nastiness, but you don't have to remove them per sey. In the case of water hyacinth you just leave it and let it do its thing.

    There are ways to bio-remediate this problem, but it will take research, time, and observation.
     
  9. sweetpea

    sweetpea Junior Member

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    I don't know if sheri is around anymore, but nitrates and coliform bacteria, if it really isn't fecal, then there's some huge agricultural runoff contributing to that water, and where it's getting into it shouldn't be too hard to find.

    If you are thinking that a snaking stream will clean the water, it is actually aeration of water that may clean it -- may. Just snaking it through dirt won't give it much aeration. The example in Permaculture of the 7 layers of mushroom-shaped birdbath-looking aerators that line up downhill from each other, allowing water to rapidly swirl in each one before moving on to the next, may help some, but it really would depend on the levels in the water to start with.

    With levels that high, I would think that the county or someone in the municipality ought to help find out where it's coming from.
     
  10. Pakanohida

    Pakanohida Junior Member

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    With regards to aeration of water, check out flow forms.
     
  11. sherimenelli

    sherimenelli Junior Member

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    Thanks everyone for your responses. I just got a soil sample test results back and thought I should post it. I tested the soil in an area that is always wet even though it is draining (probably because it is mostly clay with some loam). Also it has been wet for 8 years so it isn't surprising to me that they found HIGH salt content. The grass in the back yard died years ago. We replaced it a few times but it kept dying. Thinking back, there was always a layer of white over the dirt that extended 3-4 feet out front the hole.

    https://www.dropbox.com/s/ytg0thg2xpmtkec/Soil%20Test%203-1-2013.pdf?m

    Would love to know based on this information what to do!

    Sheri
     
  12. purplepear

    purplepear Junior Member

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    Occupation:
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    When it comes to soil Sheri - what ever the question - the answer is organic matter. pH low - OM, pH high - OM, too sandy - OM, too clay - OM, too sandy - OM, salt - OM. Mulching the area heavely with perhaps horse manure and/or spoilt lucern hay will bring the soil back to usable. Have you seen the little vid "greening the desert? I believe the desalting of the soil was due to the thick mulch and the fungi that existed in that mulch. It wont hurt anything to try.
     
  13. sherimenelli

    sherimenelli Junior Member

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    Awesome. Thanks. I am mulching like crazy. I have some friend who has horse manure(Without de-wormer or antibiotics) and I'll throw in my worms. I'll let you know what happens.

    Thanks!
     
  14. Pakanohida

    Pakanohida Junior Member

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    When in doubt, OM (Organic Matter) it out! :rofl:
     
  15. sherimenelli

    sherimenelli Junior Member

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    So, I started digging around the wet smelly clay area this morning. At the moment, I dont' have manure so What I'm doing is digging about a foot down and then mixing in dried grass, food scraps, coffee grounds and compost . I'm adding tree mulch on top of it all. Later when I get some manure I'll add that as well.

    Any thoughts or comments on doing it that way?

    It is always so wet in that area I'm afraid it will start smelling even worse from getting anerobic.

    I figure after I dig it all and mix in the organic matter I'll add some plants that will do well over there (Canna, Calla Lilly, sedges, grasses - have to figure out all that I want to plant over there)
     
  16. eco4560

    eco4560 New Member

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    Think about trees as well, they'll suck up water and send it out of their leaves.
     
  17. Sandman

    Sandman Junior Member

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    Maple is good at sucking up water and releasing it from the leaves. Silver leaf maple is excellent. If the ground is too wet for maple, then bald cypress or black gum. All of these trees get huge, so think about whether or not you have enough room for them, and what will be in their shade.
     

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