Spring Rains Bring Clogged Gutters

Spring is a wonderful time of year unless you are stuck cleaning out your gutters. Besides being an unwanted chore, there can be serious consequences that come with damaged and obstructed gutters. Gutters sole purpose is to divert water away from your home and roof- if this is not the case, possible problems can be mold, mildew, roof damage, siding damage, and foundational damage. Gutters filled with debris often rust as the leaves decompose. Gutters full of water can become to heavy and fall off causing roof and siding damager. Standing water at the base of your home poses a potentially large problem to your basement but mostly your foundation, causing it to become weaker over time, crack, mold, mildew, or dry rot.

Get ahead of the game and make sure your gutters are ready for the Spring rains and Fall leaves by keeping up on your gutter maintenance. A few things to pay attention to:

Make sure water is being directed away from your home. Typically older homes often have a “splash block” that sits underneath the downspout and sends the water away. Some newer homes might have downspouts that go under the ground and connect to underground drainpipes. Standing water at the base of your home can be detrimental to the foundation.

Make sure you have flashing at the eaves; this protects the wooden fascia that the gutters connect too. If the wood fascia does not have flashing, when a gutter gets backed up the wood sits in that water. That wood will rot, get termites, roof rot, or even insect manifestation.

Make sure the gutter pitch is effective for water to flow towards the downspout. If the flow runs smoothly, water will drain instead of pool. If there is standing water in the gutters the possible problems are rusting gutters, foundation issues from over spillage, bugs, and roof/siding damage if the gutter becomes too heavy and falls.

Don’t have any loose or missing gutter segments. Having uncontrolled water will lead to it going into any unwanted areas such as window trim, doors, siding, foundation. Besides ruining your gardening, this water can cause mold, mildew, rotting, siding damage- especially with fiber cement siding, crawlspace moisture, or even damage to your structural integrity.

If cleaning out gutters is not your thing, think about getting some form of gutter protection. Having a form of gutter guard has many benefits: gutters only need to be cleaned out 3-5 years instead of 2 times a year. Since leaves aren’t decomposing inside the gutters, your gutters won’t prematurely rust. Water flow will be more consistent, have less to no blockage, and less stagnant water which means less breeding insects.