I am sick of the garden it's waterlogged again.

[WildFlowerBees]

Clay soil, garden is on a slight slope to garage. Every year at the lowest point against the garage wall it's waterlogged and the rest of the garden is just a squelchy mess. We have to wait months for it to dry out enough to mow it.

Are we going to have to remove the (rubbish) turf, mix in some sand and re lay decent turf?

I'm told we can't level off the garden as it'll cause damp in the garage.

I want to put some lovely plants in this year but I can't stand the crap grass and months of it being so soggy.

We had this problem. Over winter was the worst, with inches of standing water around the house. Our local soil is not just clay, but so clayish there was a local brickworks nearby. To combat it, I keep adding sharp sand and organic matter to my front garden, which is slowly helping. I've lost bulbs before, they just rotted away despite the floor of grit I put them on.

Our answer for the back garden was land drains (which might be the same as the French drains PPs have referred to). There's a network of drains across the garden in a herringbone type design, leading to a spine which goes to the corner of the garden by the house. The drain goes around the edge of the house to a soakaway or drain. It actually works very well, we don't get standing water any more and in dry weather spells you can see where the drains are as the grass is less lush and green above them.

It depends how big an area you have OP, but you could construct some kind of drainage system that will certainly make it a lot better, helped by trees and shrubs. Our neighbour-but-one has dug his own land drains leading to a sump, which has solved the problem for him. The neighbour in between our gardens hasn't done anything and unfortunately her garden resembles Venice at times. It really is a big problem, especially when it affects buildings.

Don't forget that to change clay soil to loam, you would have to add one molecule of sand for every molecule of clay. And clay particles are tiny compared to sand particles. You would have to dig out a lot of clay and replace it with topsoil, and even then you've still got a layer of poorly draining material underneath.