Posted: Thu Sep 11, 14 6:50 pm Post subject: Query on cleaning silted and overgrown ditches
So we have a ditch across our land that is silted up and overgrown - grass, reeds. We've been working along it with spades and that is getting pretty old..... (so are we).
For most of its length there are mature trees that would make it very difficult to use a mechanical digger - and we absolutely, do not want to damage, let alone cut down the trees.
Any suggestions for a small scale mechanical/powered method for cleaning this out? Ideally something that would cope with breaking up the plants and remove them and the silt - just onto the bank would be fine.
There are some very small diggers available, are you sure you can't get one in?
What the 'loon said. There was an episode of George Clarke's Amazing Spaces recently where they drove one through the house, with standard doors, to get it into the garden, so I suspect you can manage it without too much cutting back.
Hairyloon
Joined: 20 Nov 2008 Posts: 15425 Location: Today I are mostly being in Yorkshire.
Posted: Thu Sep 11, 14 11:25 pm Post subject:
Also, it rarely hurts to give trees a bit of a trim: if they're mature they can probably lose some lower branches quite happily and look better for it.
You may be able to hire one of the tiny ones, but you should also look at the wheels to make sure they are large enough to cope with the ground. If it is an old ditch it was probably kept open every year by the hedger and ditcher who dug it out, threw the mud under the hedge and layed the hedge too, so wouldn't be designed for mechanical diggers.
Treacodactyl Downsizer Moderator
Joined: 28 Oct 2004 Posts: 25795 Location: Jumping on the bandwagon of opportunism
Posted: Fri Sep 12, 14 7:40 am Post subject:
Do you need to clear it out? It's not uncommon to see ditches deliberately filled with branches to slow the water down.
Could you dig a new one parallel? No trees to worry about and a normal sized digger could be used?
It very much depends upon what the ditch is for, the effect of it on the larger drainage system and vice versa. In some places drainage has been recently partly blocked as it was cutting back and draining wanted mires. Trees and branches are also left to slow down water to prevent flooding downstream by keeping the water back and releasing it more slowly.
In other cases, blocked ditches have been the cause of significant flooding of adjacent and upstream property.
I know of examples of both within Hampshire, so would recommend finding out the how that ditch fits in before going with one or the other.
Thanks all. We've been maintaining it by hand for some years and know how it fits in the wider landscape and that it needs clearing or "upstream" will flood. It is very shallow in terms of pitch/flow. We always leave a rim of plants for the wildlife and follow good practice.
Mechanical digger is a no-no, there are other access issues as well as the trees - a really small digger such as described wouldn't be able to reach.
Digging a new one is out - apart from other considerations it starts on someone else's land and continues across our other neighbour.
We just got behind last year and this year it is far more work and we have limited time, so were hoping for an easier, faster option.
What are the other access issues? It sounds like paying someone to do the work is going to be the only option that will suit all the criteria, but it's hard to say without seeing it.
We are not going down the mechanical digger/tree trimming route.
We were hoping for an answer along the lines of "ooh I've used the super-duper (TM) silt sucker and its great." Or "I made a xxx I can sell you one" etc
I've been looking on line (from before posting this question) and so far all tools seem to be split between pond vacuum cleaners - which would do what we want but would have to be emptied every other minute - and whacking great hydraulic/diesel things for use on building sites.
Once we have the plants out and are back on to keeping the silt levels down, anyone got any suggestions for a mechanical way, ideally pumping, for removing silt? Has someone used a pond vacuum cleaner in such a way that it is not a bucket at a time but got some sort of continuous output?
We just want a way of moving the silt from the bottom of the run, to the top of the bank next to it, that doesn't involve us and a spade each.
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