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Drought and Your Home:
This drought happened with no recovery from the last drought this affects crops, plants, landscapes and can also cause problems for structures like your home. Sticking doors or windows or cracks in walls and ceilings may be indication that the building is shifting due to soil shrinkage.
Subsoil and The Possible Affect on Your home:
The drought is causing not only dry soil on top, also the deeper moisture decreases, resulting in deep subsoil shrinkage. This can cause foundation support to be removed as soil shrinks, which can cause movement in the foundation of your home.
What Can Be Done to Prevent Soil Shrinkage:
This can be minimized before becoming a problem by watering the soil evenly around the entire building during extended dry periods if the soil is pulling away from the wall or foundation this should be noted and watched. This information will help you figure out the areas most in need of watering, you do not need to drench the area or the cracks with water. Simply apply water 1 to 2 feet away from the wall or foundation edge. Remember wet the soil without getting water into the cracks as this can cause an erosion situation of the dry soil. You may want to cover the cracks with plastic to prevent air drying and prevent erosion from water that may leak in from the topsoil.
Easiest Method to Prevent Soil Shrinkage:
A preventive measure is to utilize a soaker-type hose with low pressure as this works well, you will need to apply the water slowly with rest periods of several hours to permit the water to soak into the soil gradually several feet deep into the soil. During severe drought this is difficult, it is still recommended for about 10 minutes a day, preferably in the late evening or early morning when the temperature is cooler. I know it is hard to make a choice on landscape or foundation, however landscape will not provide you shelter and there are many ways you can utilize grey water for flowers, plants and landscape.
Grey Water Use:
When possible use grey water collected from hand washing, rinsing glasses, plates, silver ware, but not pots and pans due to the oils that can still be present. It is also a good idea to keep a bucket in the shower to catch the first water before the shower gets hot. This technique may produce enough drought friendly water to be applied using a watering can around the perimeter of your home. It likely will not migrate enough to close the gap near the surface, but it will wet the soil at greater depths and minimize the potential for soil shrinkage that may affect the structure.
Important Notes:
*DO NOT FILL THE CRACK with soil, experts and several university researchers advise when the soil gets wet, it will expand, pushing the wall, or foundation with possibly enough pressure to crack a wall or foundation.* I am a Realtor not a Foundation Expert and this is advice to assist in prevention, each situation is unique and should be treated as such.
**Remember that if the crack occurred due to soil shrinkage, the soil will expand when it gets wet. If you feel that this is becoming an issue with your home it is wise to contact a foundation expert, to save expense down the road.**
