Call or Text Today:
- jeff@premiumleafguards.com
- Mon - Fri : 9:00am-5:00pm
A catch basin is a grated box set at the low point of your yard that collects surface water and pipes it away. A dry well is a buried, stone-filled chamber that holds that water and lets it soak slowly into the soil. In Ocala, Premium Leaf Guards adds both to a solid-PVC drainage system when heavy Florida rain has nowhere else to go.
If your yard still floods after a hard storm, even with gutters and downspouts, the water needs a place to land. A catch basin grabs the water where it pools, and a dry well gives it somewhere to disappear when there is no ditch, swale, or low spot to send it. We build both into a buried solid-PVC system, set the right distance from your foundation, and size them for the water your lot actually sheds. The owner, a state-licensed home and building inspector, is on every job.
Licensed home & building inspector on every job · Non-woven fabric and washed stone · Real fall, real discharge · Serving Ocala & Central Florida.
Because moving water off the roof is only half the job. The other half is giving that water, plus everything that runs across the yard in a storm, a place to go.
On a lot of Central Florida lots there is no easy answer. The ground is flat, there is no ditch or swale at the property line, the neighbor sits higher, or a layer of clay or hardpan under the sand keeps the water from soaking away. Ocala gets about 52 inches of rain a year, and from June through September it comes in fast afternoon storms that can drop six to eight inches in a month.
When there is nowhere to send all that water, it backs up and sits. You see it as a low spot that stays underwater for days, a driveway or walkway that floods every storm, mulch and soil washing away, mosquitoes breeding in the puddle, and water creeping back toward the house.
Here is the honest part. This is usually a lot problem, not something you did, and the fix is to give the water a path and a place to land instead of letting it pond against your home.
Standing water never just stays a lawn problem. Left alone it kills the grass, breeds mosquitoes all summer, erodes the soil, and softens the ground your foundation, driveway, and patio sit on. Water that keeps ponding against the house works its way toward the slab and the crawlspace, where it feeds settling, mold, and wood rot. A flooded yard today is often a cracked slab or a sick crawlspace later.
There is a second way to lose: paying for a dry well that was dropped in the wrong spot or built without fabric and washed stone, so it silts up or sits in saturated ground and quits taking water within a couple of seasons. Done wrong, the whole thing has to come back out. The cost of doing it right one time is small next to digging up the yard twice.
They do two different jobs, and on a hard case they work together.
A catch basin is the collector. It is a grated box set into the ground at the lowest point of the yard, under a cluster of downspouts, or beside a driveway or patio where water sheets across. The grate stops leaves and debris, the box catches sediment so it does not travel down the line, and a pipe carries the water out the bottom to wherever it can safely go.
A dry well is the destination. It is a buried chamber, either a stone-filled pit wrapped in non-woven fabric or a manufactured perforated well surrounded by washed stone, that holds a surge of water and lets it percolate down into the soil over the hours after a storm. You use a dry well when there is no ditch, swale, or grade change to daylight the water into.
Here is how we build them to last:
We never use the black corrugated pipe the cheap crews run, because corrugated kinks, sags, and breaks at every bend, then holds water and silt until it clogs. Solid PVC stays smooth and keeps its fall.
We wrap the dry well in fabric and surround it with washed stone so the surrounding dirt cannot wash in and blind it off. That is what keeps it taking water for the long haul.
We set the dry well at least 10 to 15 feet from the foundation, the septic, and any structure, so the water it releases goes down and out, not back toward the house.
Before we commit to a dry well, we check whether your soil and water table will actually take the water, because a dry well only works where the ground can drink it.
Everything is done to current codes and modern standards, and the owner is on the job doing about half the work himself, because a drainage system is only as good as the installer.
Catch basins and dry wells are easy to do badly. Drop a basin with no fall, run cheap corrugated pipe to a stone pit with no fabric, and skip the soil check, and it will drain for one season and then plug with mud or sit full in saturated ground. That is the system we get called to dig out and rebuild.
Built right, with solid PVC, fabric, washed stone, the proper setback, and a soil that can take the water, it keeps working storm after storm. Pay once, not twice.
A spot that floods every storm, a driveway or patio under water, a yard with nowhere to drain, or roof water with no place to land. Call or text and describe it.
We walk the lot, find where the water comes from and where it can go, and check whether the soil will take a dry well. Then we lay out the right setup: where the basin sits, how the pipe runs, and where the water lands. If the cause is not obvious, our $100 diagnostic gets you a real answer, and it is credited to the job if you hire us.
We set the basin true to grade, run solid PVC on real fall, build the dry well with fabric and washed stone at a safe setback, backfill, and leave the yard clean. Workmanship is warrantied, backed by our 2-year workmanship warranty.
Catch basins and dry wells are for the homeowner whose yard floods no matter what, or whose lot simply has nowhere to send the water. Many of our clients are established and retiree homeowners across Central Florida who would rather pay once for drainage that works than fight standing water every wet season.
Here is the honest part, and it matters: most yards do not need a dry well. If grading, a downspout extension, buried underground drainage, or a French drain solves your problem, we will tell you that, because the goal is a dry yard, not the biggest invoice. Catch basins and dry wells are the tools we reach for in the extreme cases, beyond what a French drain alone can handle.
They are usually one piece of a larger plan. When roof water dumping at the house is the trouble, buried solid PVC underground drainage is the better starting point. When a soggy yard needs to be collected and carried off, a French drain does the collecting and often discharges into a dry well. When water runs in from a hillside or a higher neighbor, a curtain drain catches it at the line. See how it all fits together on our drainage & water mitigation page.
We serve Ocala, The Villages, and the surrounding Central Florida communities. See the full service area.
Picture the next hard summer storm. The rain comes down fast, the yard sheds water toward the low spot, and instead of a pond forming, the water drops into the basin, runs through the pipe, and disappears into the dry well to soak away over the next few hours. A day later the yard is firm again. The grass comes back.
No lake by the driveway, no mosquitoes hovering over a puddle, no water creeping toward the foundation. The system is buried, blended into the lawn, and built to keep working storm after storm. That is what catch basins and dry wells done right buy you: a yard that drains itself and one less thing to worry about.
A catch basin is a grated box that collects surface water at a low spot and pipes it away, catching debris and sediment as it goes. A dry well is a buried, stone-filled chamber that receives that water and lets it soak into the soil. The basin collects, the dry well disperses, and on a hard lot they are used together.
Often a French drain, grading, or downspout drainage is all you need, and we will tell you when that is the case. Catch basins and dry wells are for the extreme situations: a yard that floods no matter what, or a lot with nowhere to daylight the water. We recommend the smallest fix that actually solves the problem.
Sometimes very well and sometimes not, which is why we check first. Sandy, permeable soil drinks water fast and is ideal for a dry well, but a clay or hardpan layer or a high seasonal water table can leave the well sitting full. We test the soil and look at the water table before we commit to one, so you do not pay for a well the ground cannot use.
It is sized to the water it has to hold, not a guess. We base it on the area draining into it and how fast your soil takes water, generally enough to handle about an inch of rain off that area at once. Residential dry wells commonly run a few feet across and several feet deep. We size yours to your lot.
At least 10 to 15 feet from the foundation, and away from the septic system and other structures. A dry well releases water into the ground, so it has to sit far enough out that the water goes down and away instead of back toward your slab or crawlspace.
Yes, a little. The grate and the basin catch leaves and sediment so they do not clog the line, and that material needs to be cleared out now and then, more often under heavy oak and pine debris. It is a quick job, and it is the trade-off for keeping the pipe and the dry well clean.
Solid PVC runs smooth, holds its fall, and does not snag debris, so the water keeps moving. The black corrugated pipe the cheap crews use kinks, sags, and breaks at the bends, then holds water and silt until it clogs. Solid PVC is the difference between a system that drains for decades and one that fails in a few years.
It depends on how much water the lot sheds, how far the pipe has to run, the soil, and whether you need a basin, a dry well, or both. We do not post prices because no two yards are the same, and we will not quote you blind. Call or text (352) 440-3310 for a free, all-in estimate.
