Landscaping in Hockinson, WA starts below the grass, with a soil that carries the community's name. The USDA's Hockinson series is somewhat poorly drained with very slow permeability, and it sits in the low, flat spots on stream terraces where winter water collects. Add acreage, horse barns and long drives, and most yard work here comes down to moving water and keeping the edges of the land open.
Bogar Landscaping travels from Woodland to Hockinson for free on-site estimates, and we work the whole 98606 area, including Brush Prairie, plus neighboring Venersborg. One crew handles drainage, clearing, gravel, lawns and hardscape, so a property with several problems gets one plan.
The Hockinson Soil Series and Why Water Sits on Hockinson Yards
The Hockinson series was described from a site on NE 199th Street in Clark County, and its official description reads like a list of winter yard complaints: somewhat poorly drained, slow runoff, very slow permeability, found in depressional areas on stream terraces between 200 and 400 feet. The native plants listed for it, red alder, Oregon ash, western redcedar, sedges and hardhack, are wet-ground species.
Clark County puts Hockinson soil in its poorly drained group and rates those soils not suitable for infiltration. On the ground that means:
- Drywells and infiltration trenches rarely work in the low spots. The water has to be carried somewhere, not buried.
- A rain garden needs an underdrain or overflow, and an infiltration test before anyone digs the bowl.
- One parcel can hold two soils. Higher, sloping ground nearby may be a better-drained series such as Hesson, so a property can have a soggy swale and a dry knoll a few hundred feet apart.
We pull up your parcel on the NRCS Web Soil Survey, confirm it with a shovel, then design drains that move water over the surface or through pipe to a discharge point on property you control.
Acreage and Horse Properties in Hockinson, WA
Hockinson covers about 14 square miles at roughly 4.3 acres of land per household, and properties for sale here include horse barns and equestrian places on parcels of a few acres. On a horse property, the landscaping that matters most happens where people, animals and vehicles meet:
- Pasture edges and fence lines. Himalayan blackberry crowds into fences and shades out grass. We cut the canes and dig out the crowns by machine so the fence line stays open.
- Gravel where trucks and trailers turn. Barn approaches, trailer parking and long drives rut and puddle on slow-draining soil. We regrade, crown and resurface them with crushed rock.
- Water around barns and gates. Roof runoff from a barn or shop can turn a gateway into mud. We pipe downspouts away and cut swales or French drains to a surface outlet.
- The house lawn. Even on a working property, the lawn by the house gets mowed, edged and striped.
Pasture management itself, such as mud control and grazing plans, is outside landscaping. WSU Extension's Small Acreage Program and the Clark Conservation District both offer local help with it.
Old Farm Country With New Custom Homes
Finnish and Swedish sailors settled Hockinson in 1862, and it was first called Eureka before taking the name of its postmaster. Elim Lutheran Church, dedicated in 1899 with a bell tower added in 1907, remains a community landmark. The housing shows that long history: 22 percent of homes predate 1970, yet 24 percent went up in the 2010s.
So within one mile you can find a farmhouse with decades-old plantings and a new custom home on a bare pad. The new place needs a yard built from scratch: grading, roof drainage, lawn, beds and irrigation sized to the water supply. The old one needs renovation around mature trees and outbuildings.
If your place has a private well, a septic system or both, the drainage plan has to respect them. Washington's rain garden handbook keeps rain gardens at least 100 feet from drinking-water wells and, when they sit uphill of a septic system, at least 50 feet from it, and we keep drain lines and dispersion areas clear of drainfields too. Show us the well head, tank and drainfield on the first walk and we design around them.
