Your new-build backyard is compacted clay. Now what?

A new house in the GTA usually comes with a rear yard of graded clay, a fence, and a thin skin of topsoil with sod on it. That is not a yard. It is a starting point.

What is under there

Months of machinery traffic during construction compacts clay into something close to a floor. Water cannot move down through it and roots cannot move into it. That single fact explains the puddles, the thin lawn and the wet corner.

Do not build on top of the problem

Laying a patio over an uncorrected grade locks in every drainage issue you have. Water that used to sit on the lawn now sits against your foundation or under your new stone.

The order that works

• Establish where water needs to go, and set grade to move it there
• Install drainage where grade cannot do it alone
• Build hardscape on properly excavated and compacted base
• Amend soil and plant, with real topsoil rather than builder fill
• Sod or seed last

The advantage of starting from bare

There is nothing to demolish. Everything can be planned once, together, and built in one project — which is almost always cheaper than three separate visits over five years.

Clay, grade and standing water