high ground water kitchen garden

howdy folks,
So my neighbour who lives right on the edge of the forest, has limited area to establish his kitchen garden, and as it turns out, the only properly viable spot has high ground water, and seasonally  ( autumn/spring)it gets very waterlogged, in fact it was at some point a pond or something. ( we have heard from neighbours) its not really possible to drain the area, as theres nowhere to drain it to. summer is fine, and generally not noticeable unless we get a lot of rain.
Today we talked about establishing hugel beds on the area, with the idea that the veg wouldnt be in standing water, and overall, try to turn the problem into a solution.
anybody got any thoughts on establishing a kitchen garden on soggy ground? or if the hugel idea sounds reasonable?
thanks in advance.

Good afternoon,

Our kitchen garden is in a wet place.  I built raised beds that are about 12" tall, 30" wide and 30 feet long.  Grass and various other plants grow in the paths between and I mow it.  The raised beds keep the vegies from being water logged and the grass in the paths means I can walk in the garden with out collecting mud on my boots.  Bonus is that we can plant a few weeks earlier in the spring since the raised beds dry sooner after the snow melts.  The grass works like a living mulch in the path so even when its hot and dry the garden doesn't dry out as much.  I would take a picture but its -37 degrees and the beds are buried in snow.

Hi Judd,
Hugelkultur (I always have to look up the spelling of that) beds would be a good idea. The more organic matter in the soil, the more water it can hold without drowning the plants. Wood filled beds is a good way to accomplish this... though it is a lot of shoveling to cover anything of a decent size. Wood chips are always good, but those should go on top. You could drop maybe 6" of wood chips, then a layer of something high nitrogen like fresh chicken manure, blood meal, or coffee grounds. Then keep doing layers. If you could get at least 3+ feet of layers, cover it with a tarp and give it a year. You would probably end up with about 1 foot of good compost. It would raise the level, have a lot of nutrients, and have a lot of organic matter to provide a buffer against the water.

Hi Tim, thanks very much for your input and suggestion. hadnt even considered raised beds to be honest! being that its my neighbours project, its up to him how much he wants to invest, but i think he would rather not be forking out for the exorbitant cost of materials to create said high beds.
having just said that, perhaps i misinterpreted your message. do you mean raised beds with sides of wood or something similar, or do you just mean the beds are built up high on the ground without sides?
i personally have 6 inch high wood around all my beds, just to stop all the good compost escaping, but when they rot out, i wont be replacing them.
does the soggy ground not wick straight up into your beds? obviously not enough to be a problem-
this was our thinking too, take an excess of water and turn it into just the right amount with no need to irrigate.

Hi Matt, thanks very much for your input.
one thing hes not in short supply of is compost, of which he has oodles.
because the ground underneath is clay, and not draining well at all ( we have no idea whats below, the fact that it was a pond could mean it has been amended to hold MORE water rather than drain)
i have no dig beds myself with 3 inches or so of compost on top at all times ( ramial woodchips mainly) but my ground underneath drains well, and my constant addition of more organic material is only improving it year by year, so the plants at my neighbors would need to be a ways off the ground to stop their roots being soggy was my thinking on it.
but yeah, essentially what you said is my thinking on it, there needs to be a heck of a buffer ( 3 foot sounds about right to me)
we have access to endless amounts of wood from the forest, and its free, which was the thinking for the hugelkultur. i have never actually made or used any hugel beds, but depending on who you talk to, and what material you add when the beds are made, they can be planted immediately without the need to wait for a year. again, untested by us, but we have oodles of stuff to amend hugel beds with, that would support crops the first year for sure.
do you  have hugelkultur beds or wet areas you have made high beds on?
thanks again.

I've got a garden in a low spot that floods every late winter/spring. The first year we lived here the water was probably three feet deep in some spots, but since I've started gardening there it hasn't been more than a few inches at most.

In the lowest spot, where the water gets deepest, I built a hugelculture. Mine's maybe 35' long, 4-8' wide (it's got some curves), and about 3' tall. I did mine wide with a flat top to maximize water absorption from rain and minimize erosion. In the spring, judging by the how wet things are around it, the bottom 3-6" are probably completely flooded. I haven't noticed any problems with any of the perennials growing at the base.

My in ground beds get flooded, but they typically dry out by the time it's warm enough to plant most things anyway. I figure the higher water table helps the plants later on in the summer once we've gone a while without rain.

If the wood used is large enough to cause harm to people or property downstream, it’s important to consider how flood water will flow around, rather than through the hugel. Especially in the first season, the wood in a hugel can float. I’ve had to build gardens and food forests in places with high ground water and upwards of 30cm/day rain events, and used hugels to give roots space up out of the anaerobic ground. They have withstood large rain events and literally millions of gallons of of running water around them because we oriented the hugels to reduce the erosiveness of that flow, and allowed for positive drainage over a wide outlet. These multiple overflows are also the path/driveway that leads into an evergreen forest. It is hopefully too obvious to need pointing out, but it would be a bummer to have a woody debris pile floating down floodwaters.

Hey Jan!
Thanks very much for sharing your experience.
Just the kind of good news I was hoping for! Precisely the kind of logic I was hoping would mitigate the problem and turn the extra water into a resource.
Also, in line with someone elses suggestion, it sounds like a high bed/ hugel hybrid, but either way, getting the benefits and mitigating the problem.
I think we are gonna go for  it!
Thanks again.

Hey Ben!
Thank you so much for your wise advice.
while we dont have "flooding" issues per se, its definitely something to consider the eventual excess water runnoff/ potential flooding events in the future, and the routing of the excess water.
We just started discussing the idea yesterday, but bed orientation and pathway/ excess water runoff was already in the back of our minds, so thank you for your input!

how did it turn out?? looking to do something similar here in my lower field where water is seasonally pooling

vv anderson wrote:how did it turn out?? looking to do something similar here in my lower field where water is seasonally pooling

Last year I've built a hugel in similar conditions. Heavy clay and seasonal flooding (winter). In summer often really dry due to little organic matter. I consider my experiment a success I grew lots of pumpkins without having to water during the dry hot months. So this year I'm building another one! If interested you can read my post: https://permies.com/t/190521/Hugel-anti-drought-flood-success.