Front Porch Bed - Drainage and Turf Issues - March 2024

Last Summer (June), I extended and (attempted) to clean up the front edge of our 'front porch bed' along the south property line.  The edge had been creeping 'inward' over the years, so I decided to use a shovel to remove as much of the grass as I could, carve off a clean edge and sort-of 'extend' the swoop of that bed a little bit into the lawn.    If you look back at the photos in this post, you'll see a nice, grass-free edge that I planted with bedding plants (dwarf, French Marigolds) and Dusty Millers.  

By September, the dwarf (French) Marigolds took off and filled in the new border.  They looked great and were thick/full of oranges, reds and yellows.  Behind those annuals went a colony of Summer Beauty Alliums.  Backed by some small Green Velvet Boxwoods to extend the existing short hedge of boxwoods.  

All was good last year.  

This year, I've already started to clean up this bed - cutting down grasses and raking out some of the season's 'left leaves'.  

But, there's more work to do and involves the re-emergence of grass (KBG) and drainage.   See below for a photo of the border on a recent rainy day: 

That shows a lot of standing water (in the bottom 'curved' portion of the bed and an (almost) complete TAKEOVER of turfgrass in the front of that bed.  

I'm going to have to get busy out there and I'm thinking of laying down cardboard and piling dirt on top.  First, to smother the lawn.  Then, to fill in the edge to keep the water moving away from this area.  

I included this as one of my 'early look' for my 2024 priorities.