No matter where you live, you will have seen this. When there's a storm, a week of rain, when snow melts? There's always a spot in your yard, your street or neighborhood where water puddles and takes much longer to dry out

There are reasons for this. Those areas are usually lower than the surrounding land and there are drainage issues. Buildings in the area contribute to the problem, as those surfaces that normally would absorb the water are paved and no longer take in water. That's why water puddles in undeveloped ground nearby.

When this happens in your own yard, it poses a threat to the property. In extreme cases, when the ground is hyper-saturated, it can seep into foundations. It can also flood basements and low-lying properties.

The most elegant solution to this issue happens to be the most environmentally friendly one as well: building a rain garden.

Rain garden

Its technical name is an infiltration or retention garden. A rain garden uses several methods to drain water and retain it more efficiently. It's a designed landscape that uses different layers of permeable subsoil that guide excess water in a specific direction.

On top of that rain-accumulation area and special layers of soil they plant a garden made of perennial flowers, shrubs and small tress. They use species that adapt well both to very humid and dry seasons; that way, they will need nothing except that excess rain water.

Added benefits

Rain gardens can fix a problem. However, they're still gardens and they serve two additional purposes:

• They're habitats for local fauna, small rodents, birds and even pollinators.
• They absorb and eradicate polluting elements brought on by water: trace metals, bacteria, oils and grease.