DCHOA Community Lower Rain Garden

Juliet Page's Watershed Stewards Academy Capstone Project - Part 1.
Saturday June 27th 2009 - 9am until Noon

We had 9 community members come out to help with the planting of the Divinity Cove Community Lower Rain Garden.  Thanks to all for the help!!  This was the first part of Juliet Page's capstone project as part of the Watershed Steward’s Academy Certification Program.  We were awarded over $850 in grant funds from the Watershed Steward's Academy and the Chesapeake Bay Trust to cover the cost of the native plants / mulch / materials for the garden. Divinity Cove Homeowner Association also provided some funding to cover the cost of the drain, pipe, landscape fabric and other non plant landscape items.  The rain garden is on community property along the paved access road leading to the Divinity Cove Pier and the AACo DPW Divinity Cove Pump Station.  It's on Mill Church Road in Arnold MD, 21012.  Here's a map of the area if you would like to come by sometime to see the garden in person!

As part of the project preparation the following was completed:

There are still a few follow-Up activities which are ongoing & not quite completed ...yet:

Here is the basic Rain Garden Design as submitted for permitting... Note that we ended up tweaking the design a bit on-site because some of the plant materials were not available and because of concerns with the volume of stormwater runoff in the area.  There was some existing trickle of flow towards the drain as we had been having lots of rain in the preceding weeks.  So we made a pooling area around the drain, and put in a supplemental rain garden depression just south (towards the bottom in the diagram below) of the drain area to also capture the water running off the asphalt access road.  We also put in a deliberate overflow area over the earthen berm so that when we get our next major rain storm the water would naturally flow this way.  The overflow was lined with a weed lining water penetrate-able landscape fabric and lined with larger sized rocks.

Here is a photo of the area "BEFORE" the rain garden.

The remainder of the photos were taken on June 27th - Planting Day!  Again thanks to the many volunteers who helped make this possible.

This is an informational sign I put together with general rain garden Why's and how-to's and had on-site for people to read.  If you want more information about Rain Gardens, I highly recommend you visit www.rainscaping.org.  This particular website is part of a RainScaping Campaign to improve the health of Anne Arundel County's tributaries and the Chesapeake Bay.  It's tailored specifically for the Chesapeake Bay Watershed!

This is the manual labor part - re-grading the site so that the water would flow into a depression to cool, soak in and be absorbed by the plant materials rather than running straight into Mill Creek!  If there's enough rain, the elevations are such that it will overflow into the area where the drain is located.

The plants are anxious to get into their new home!

The really nice dark black soil amendment is Leaf Grow.  It provides some good nutrients for the new plants.  The area had been planted with grass which was roto-tilled in the day before the rain garden planting.  The leaf-grow was spread on and mixed in after the terrain was graded the way we wanted it and before we started putting in the plants.

The site has been graded at this point and you can see the darker soil amendments spread over part of it.  All the plants are in the trailer ready to go!  Many thanks to Suzanne at Arlington Echo for organizing the wholesale purchase for all of our Watershed Steward projects!

Planting planting planting....  We put grasses which are heat tolerant up against the fence.  They will handle the reflection from the sun and the dryer soil up there better.  The grasses planted are Muhlenbergia Capillaris.

The yellow flowers are Coreopsis verticillanta Zagreb and were planted a little lower on the hill and towards the paved area.  They too can handle full sun.

Lower down near the runoff stream (you can see where it's wet and muddy) we planted ferns which like "wet feet".  In the shadier areas we put in Cinnamon Ferns.  Slightly up the slope on the fence getting into the sun went Black Eyed Susans (Rudebeckia). Further up the hill from there is Monarda Petite Delight.

When we graded we extended the berm that was already there and made a distinct path for the rain overflow to follow.  The base is a landscape fabric (to keep weeds out) which was weighted down with rocks we collected and found on-site.

You can see some of the water that was just running running running from the prior rain events.  The intent wasn't to create a pond or bog we put the drain here so that it wouldn't back up too much.  The drain is under the cement block thing with the rebar coming out of it.  It kept trying to float up so we had to weigh it down until the dirt and stuff settled in.  The permit inspector said that he didn't want the overflow landscape drain "IN" the stormwater drain so we cut it off before the drain.  I think it would look better cut even shorter, but I'm going to wait until the inspector comes by and tells me it's OK, just incase because it will be a real pain to have to put in a new pipe just to extend it again.  :-)

On the berm we planted Coral Bells, Heuchera Sanguinea Splendens. Hummingbirds supposedly love these flowers.  I hope they take well!  As we planted we mulched everything several inches deep.  The mulch will help hold the soil in place, the moisture in the soil, will absorb rain as well and keep down the weeds!  Plus it's all recycled.

On the left side is the depression where the runoff from the paved access road will go.  Down in this area we planted Irises (Blue Iris Cristada) who can handle the moisture and sunshine.  Further to the left is room for more of the larger Irises, however those didn't make it with our plant order.  :-(  So we'll plant them in the fall.  In the meantime some of our Divinity Cove neighbors said that their Irises are in need of splitting so they'll transplant some down to this area when the time comes as well.

And here's the landscape crew (minus the photographer!) after a few hours of morning work!  The depression that the front people are kneeling in, is where the big Irises are eventually going to go... that's the area that will catch the runoff coming down the paved pump station access road.

YAY.  It's DONE!  :-)  And looks much better than lawn and will help improve water quality in Mill Creek as well!  Thanks everyone for a job WELL DONE!