You know, this soil is blown dry and I am sure you have heard from our garden expert Ron Wilson how important it is to take care of your plants with this dry weather. Well, it is just as important to take care of your houses and especially buildings and structures and garages, that we have had what we call shallow foundations. These are ones where the footer depth is just about 30 inches or so below the level of the ground.
Now, what can happen? The ground can dry out and get so dry that the soil actually will fall and that the way to the building will basically fall down. It will push down the soil and you will get sediment cracks. How can you stop that? You water the foundation. Now, if you have an opportunity to water your foundation, go ahead and do it once a week. Leave the hose on a sprinkler or soaker hose extended for maybe a day or so alongside the foundation that lets the water get down there and trick the soil on the thinking that it is wet or it is raining up above.
Now, if you are building a brand new house or structure that has a shallow foundation, it is a great opportunity to put in some perforated drain pipe down by the footer. What you want to do is completely surround the footer with this pipe and come with different fittings. Make sure the holes point down and then you want to put a tee fitting in somewhere and bring a rise or pipe up to the surface. Now, why is that? So that when it gets dry, you can put a hose down that pipe. Leave it on overnight running just a little bit of a trickle that will keep that footer soil wet.
Okay, this dry spell is really serious. Now remember, you have got to water around those foundations and keep them wet unless of course Mother Nature does it for free.
I am Tim Carter. If you want to discover more improvement tips, go to AskTheBuilder.com.
Transcription by:
Scribe4you Transcription Services