Seems like it could at least help to pull water out of the low point. Drain the downspout into it as well.
Only downside vs a regular sump seems like it would have the potential to freeze and more potential for debris to get in there.
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Seems like it could at least help to pull water out of the low point. Drain the downspout into it as well.
Only downside vs a regular sump seems like it would have the potential to freeze and more potential for debris to get in there.
Yes. We actually had the sump pump outside in one of our houses. They put it in after the fact so they put the drain tile around the perimeter and attached it to a deep pit below the freeze level. Worked OK, but it was difficult to keep the pit clean and not have it fill with mud.
Kind of like a reverse leaching pit. Something that allows water to enter from the ground and pump it out. How far are your ponds from the house? If you could pump the water into the ponds would be ideal.
The best defense against flooding is living in a place that isn't prone to floods.
We live on the low ground relative to nearby houses, so even though we are not a flood zone water keeps pooling into my house. If the house needs a sump pump just to not flood after a rainstorm or blizzard, and especially if the basement equipment like the heater is new, that is a red flag.
Honestly, this entire debacle convinced me to finally move out of central Iowa, as I was never comfortable with all the extreme weather and temperatures here (relative to just about everywhere else in the US, as summers are so hot and full of MCS derechos, winters are so cold, springs are full of violent tornadoes like the one that hit Greenfield, and there just isn't a break). Flooding is also much more common here than back where we lived in Wisconsin/Illinois.
Long term we'll probably go somewhere like Pennsylvania, Virginia, Michigan, New York, Colorado, or even central valley California if the prices there drop enough (the wildfires are mainly up in the mountains, the topography is flat so hopefully flooding is not much of an issue despite being in a giant valley, and the hot summers get compensated by mild winters, springs, and autumns without the headaches of Iowa).
That would be the plan since the lower pond is downhill approx 20 yards from the house
Agree to a point, but when you get downpours like we have had in central Iowa over the past couple of nights, topography can only do so much. We had a little water on one of the window ledgers in our basement, but no water on the rug or down the wall that I could see. It's just difficult to get rid of 5 or 6 inches of rain falling in a few hours no matter where you live. The sewer systems across the state were never designed to get rid of that much water all at once, neither were many of the sump pumps. The most helpful thing is making sure the water exits the roof and is channeled away from the house, and not allowed to build up and run down the outside of the basement wall.
There was a signif
Local topography is a big deciding factor of floods- having a house on not the lowest part of the neighborhood, so there's always a lower place for it to flow, beats any sump pump solution.
There was a significant difference between me and one of my neighbors who took the brunt of the flooding and my other neighbors who only got a inch of water at most though. For what it's worth, we did try to set up some projects like more drains and creating a dry-stream break against the water from the house, but it's quite literally an uphill battle.
Local topography is a big deciding factor of floods- having a house on not the lowest part of the neighborhood, so there's always a lower place for it to flow, beats any sump pump solution.
My FIL is a plumber and before he realized it was not in his best interest to lock horns with me he tried to convince me he could make water run uphill
The big thing is to get the water running away from you house, throw some dirt and seed down if the ground is starting to slope back towards your home, to divert the water away. Make sure you rain troughs just do not drop the water right beside the house but is carried 4 or 5 feet away from the foundation.
All the homes in our circle drive have quite a bit of sloop in the back to a drainage ditch and in the front towards the street. We get a small stream in the back of our lot by the fence, but it quickly is taken away in a few hours after a major rain storm.
