Job book · Entry 06

The yard's wet, and it hasn't rained.

A patch of yard that stays soggy has a source, and it's almost always water that belonged inside a pipe. Whether it's a small repair or a line job starts with what that spot is doing.

What it usually is

01A cracked or shifted sewer lateral leaking into the soil — the pipe between your house and the street.
02A broken irrigation line or sprinkler head bleeding water every cycle.
03A downspout or grading problem dumping roof water in one spot — heaviest after rain, then it dries.
04A main water line leak, if the spot never dries no matter the weather.
05Condensate dripping off the HVAC line right where it terminates.

Safe checks you can do now

Watch the spot across a few dry days — constant wet points to a pipe; wet that fades points to rain or irrigation.
Find your cleanout (a round cap near the foundation or walkway) and look inside — standing water there means the sewer line is holding water it shouldn't.
Run the irrigation manually and walk the zones — a geyser or a soft spot mid-cycle tells you which line leaks.
Compare the spot to where your downspouts discharge — a downspout extender solves the rain-driven version.
Check the condensate line at the outdoor unit — a steady drip on a humid Shoals afternoon is normal; a constant trickle all day is worth a look.

Where this stops being DIY

Sewage smell, soggy ground along the sewer's path to the street, or water standing in the cleanout means the line needs a camera — there's no guessing your way to a diagnosis underground. A spot that never dries regardless of rain gets checked sooner rather than eventually, because whatever's leaking isn't stopping on its own.

(256) 415-7610

House-age angle: Pre-1960 homes around Florence often run a clay or cast-iron sewer lateral that's now well past its design life — joints shift, roots find them, and a slow leak shows up as the yard's favorite wet spot. Houses from the 1980s may have plastic laterals that hold up better but still move with the clay soil this area sits on. Newer builds on PVC sewer leak less often, so a quick era check narrows the suspects fast.

What is a sewer camera check?

A small camera gets pushed down the cleanout and through the line, showing where a crack sits, whether roots are in it, and how bad any offset is. It turns 'probably the sewer' into a location and a condition — which is what any real fix gets built on.

How can I tell sewer water from irrigation water?

Sewer leaks keep the ground wet around the clock and usually bring an odor plus greener, faster-growing grass in that patch. Irrigation only wets on a schedule, so the spot dries out between cycles.