Suggestions and preparing yard

Hi All,

I was hoping I could receive some suggestions for my back yard. I'm not yet ready for full blown permaculture, but I'd like to start. I would like to know what I can do now to prepare or set up my yard this fall for permaculture design. A little about the land and my goals; I live in Rhode Island. My yard is about 2/3 of an acre. I'm not sure if I sit well on a water table or something, but my yard is fairly moist (it won't rain for weeks, yet my grass will be wet frequently and can be soggy, even after minimal rain). The back right of my yard, in the forest part, gets real swampy during periods of rains. After a large snow storm and subsequent melt last winter, the water was a couple of inches high for a while. The yard gets good sun and is edged in the back by large Norwegian Maple trees.

Ideally, I liked to plant some fruit trees (peach, pear, apple), nut trees if possible, blueberry and strawberry bushes, and create 2-3 raised garden beds with the usual garden variety. I feel like this is a good start for me, but am open to all suggestions and advice.

I'm glad I found this forum, as it seems extremely helpful.

Thanks in advance for any help/advice/suggestions/design etc provided.

Hello, you have a nice yard there. I'm a newbie but I would try to verify that water table part, as in is it a flood plain? Water movement is usually near the top of the list of things to be aware of, and in your case the water is expressing itself strongly. In my yard, just putting a few on contour hugel swales eased up a soggy patch and allowed good grass to grow in where it struggled with sogginess and high traffic. So, perhaps a hugel swale up elevation from where the water is collecting is an option.

Thanks. It's taken a lot of work just to get it there. It was a foreclosure and the grass/weeds were hip high when I bought it and i've cleared about 10 feet of brush towards the back and rights sides to increase the size of my yard. The water definitely drains towards my yard. Two of my neighbors and my yard slopes towards my right side and there is a baseball field adjacent as well (with a parking lot next to the outfield, probably about 120 yards from my property). How would I check for a water table? My uncle in law, a pretty good gardener in his day, says the watery nature of my yard is a blessing in disguise! I hope so, but it seems too swampy/overgrown to me.

Welcome to permies Bryan.
We seem to have quite a few members from RI now.
(If the truth were known though, I'll bet most of them are from PP, not RI. lol)

If the ground does remain too wet, raised beds, or huglekultur would be a way to keep the roots from water logging.

Yeah I am definitely going to do raised beds on the right side of my yard after I clear about 5 more feet of brush. My idea is to plant blueberry and strawberry bushes next to them, then some fruit trees next to them. So from right to left I would have small forest, fruit trees, bushes, raised beds. I just don't know what I should do now, so I can be prepared in the spring. I've been composting like crazy, clearing brush, etc. What else?