Farm drainage / The Principles, Processes, and Effects of Draining Land with Stones, Wood, Plows, and Open Ditches, and Especially with Tiles

by Henry F. French

Fig. 99—Drainage of Cellar.

Many persons have attempted to exclude water from their cellars by cementing them on the bottom, and part way up on the sides. This might succeed, if the cellar wall were laid very close, and in cement, and a heavy coating of cement applied to the bottom. A moment's attention to the subject will show that it is not likely to succeed, as experience shows that it seldom, if ever, does.

The water which enters cellars, frequently runs from the surface behind the cellar wall, where rats always keep open passages, and fills the ground and these passages; especially when the earth is frozen, to the surface, thus giving a column of water behind the wall six or eight feet in height. The pressure of water is always in proportion to its height or head, without reference to the extent of surface. The pressure, then, of the water against the cemented wall, would be equal to the pressure of a full mill-pond against its perpendicular dam of six or eight feet height! No sane man would think of tightening a dam, with seven feet head of water, by plastering a little cement on the down-stream side of it, which might as well be done, as to exclude water from a cellar by the process, and under the conditions, stated.

DRAINAGE OF BARN CELLARS.

Most barns in New England are constructed with good substantial cellars, from six to nine feet deep, with solid walls of stone. They serve a three-fold purpose; of keeping manure, thrown down from the cattle and horse stalls above; of preserving turnips, mangolds, and other vegetables for the stock; and of storing carts, wagons, and other farm implements. Usually, the cellar is divided by stone, brick, or wood partitions, into apartments, devoted to each of the purposes named. The cellar for manure should not be wet enough to have water flow away from it, nor dry enough to have it leach. For the other purposes, a dry cellar is desirable.

Perhaps the details of the drainage of a barn cellar on our own premises, may give our views of the best mode of drainage, both for a manure cellar, and for a root and implement cellar. The barn was built in 1849, on a site sloping slightly to the south. In excavating for the wall, at about seven feet below the height fixed for the sills, we came upon a soft, blue clay, so nearly fluid that a ten-foot pole was easily thrust down out of sight, perpendicularly, into it! Here was a dilemma! How could a heavy wall and building stand on that foundation? A skillful engineer was consulted, who had seen heavy brick blocks built in just such places, and who pronounced this a very simple case to manage. "If," said he, "the mud cannot get up, the wall resting on it cannot settle down." Upon this idea, by his advice, we laid our wall, on thick plank, on the clay, so as to get an even bearing, and drove down, against the face of the wall, edge to edge, two-inch plank to the depth of about three feet, leaving them a foot above the bottom of the wall. Against this, we rammed coarse gravel very hard, and left the bottom of the cellar one foot above the bottom of the wall, so that the weight might counterbalance the pressure of the wall and building. The building has been in constant use, and appears not to have settled a single inch.

The cellar was first used only for manure, and for keeping swine. It was quite wet, and grew more and more so every year, as the water found passages into it, till it was found that its use must be abandoned, or an amphibious race of pigs procured. It was known, that the most of the water entered at the north corner of the building, borne up by the clay which comes to within three feet of the natural surface; and, as it would be ruinous to the manure to leach it, by drawing a large quantity of water through it into drains, in the usual mode of draining, it was concluded to cut off the water on the outside of the building, and before it reached the cellar. Accordingly, a drain was started at the river, some twenty rods below, and carried up to the barn, and then eight feet deep around two sides of it, by the north corner, where most water came in.

We cut through the sand, and four or five feet into the clay, and laid one course only of two-inch pipe-tiles at the bottom. As this was designed for a catch-water, and not merely to take in water at the bottom, in the usual way, we filled the trench, after covering the tiles with tan, with coarse sand above the level of the clay, and put clay upon the top. We believe no water has ever crossed this drain, which operates as perfectly as an open ditch, to catch all that flows upon it. The manure cellar was then dry enough, but the other cellar was wanted for roots and implements, and the water was constantly working up through the soft clay bottom, keeping it of the consistency of mortar, and making it difficult to haul out the manure, and everyway disagreeable.

One more effort was made to dry this part. A drain was opened from the highway, which passes the barn, to the south corner; and about two and a half feet below the bottom of the cellar, along inside the wall, at about three feet distance from it, on two of the sides; and another in the same way, across the middle of the cellar. These, laid with two-inch tiles, and filled with gravel, were connected together, and led off to the wayside. The waste water of two watering places, one in the cellar, and another outside, supplied by an aqueduct, was conducted into the tiles, and thus quietly disposed of. The reason why the drains are filled with gravel is, that as the soft clay, in which the tiles were laid, could never have the heat of the direct rays of the sun on its surface, there might be no cracking of it, sufficient to afford passage for the water, and so this was made a catch-water to stop any water that might attempt to cross it.