Depressions & Birdbaths: Standing Water on Asphalt

Quick Verdict

A birdbath is a localized depression in your asphalt that holds standing water after it rains — usually a low spot where the pavement settled or was never properly compacted and graded. Depressions are mostly a settlement and drainage problem. They matter more than they look, because standing water is the enemy of asphalt: it works into the surface, gets into any cracks, and accelerates every other kind of damage. In wet Oregon, a birdbath that sits full for days each week is doing real harm. The fix is to patch and level the low spot so water drains, using infrared repair or a leveling patch depending on the depth.

What a Birdbath Looks Like

The easiest way to find birdbaths is to walk your pavement right after a rain. Anywhere water pools and sits — instead of running off to a drain or edge — is a depression. A common rule of thumb is that water deeper than about a quarter inch, or a puddle that lingers long after the rain stops, qualifies as a birdbath worth addressing.

Depressions can be small isolated dishes or longer low runs. They differ from rutting in asphalt, which forms specifically in wheel paths from load. A depression can be anywhere the pavement settled, mapped alongside the other distresses in our pavement distress diagnosis guide.

Why Depressions Form

Birdbaths come from the pavement surface ending up lower than it should, for a few reasons.

• Settlement. The base or subgrade beneath the spot settled or consolidated after paving, dropping the surface. This is common over backfilled utility trenches, soft soil pockets, or fill that was not compacted enough.
• Poor compaction during paving. A spot that was not compacted to grade when placed sits low from day one.
• Subgrade movement. Willamette Valley clay swells and shrinks seasonally, and uneven movement can leave low spots.
• Improper grading. Sometimes the surface was simply never built with enough slope to drain in the first place, so water pools by design.

Why Standing Water Matters in Oregon

In a dry climate a shallow birdbath might be cosmetic. In Oregon it is not. Our wet season keeps birdbaths full for much of the year, and water that sits on and in the pavement does real damage:

• It soaks into the surface and works into any crack, feeding the chain that produces potholes — see how potholes form.
• It saturates the base under the depression, weakening it and deepening the settlement, which is the same mechanism in our water damage in asphalt guide.
• It accelerates raveling, stripping, and freeze-thaw damage where the water sits.
• In freezing regions east of the Cascades, a birdbath becomes an ice patch and a slip-and-fall liability.

A birdbath is a problem that feeds other problems, which is why it is worth fixing even when it looks minor.

How to Fix Depressions

The goal is to restore the surface to a grade that drains.

1. Find the low spots. Map them after a rain and mark where water pools and how deep.
2. Check for a base cause. If the depression is from base settlement or a soft spot, the base needs attention, not just a surface patch over a problem that will keep sinking.
3. Choose the repair method:

- Infrared patching reheats the existing asphalt in place, adds material, and re-levels it, bonding seamlessly — good for shallow depressions in otherwise sound pavement. - Saw-cut and leveling patch removes the low area and replaces it built up to grade — for deeper depressions or where the base needs repair.

1. Restore drainage. Make sure the patched area now sheds water toward a drain or edge.

What It Costs

Industry Baseline Range: infrared leveling of a shallow birdbath runs in the range of $3 to $7 per square foot, while a saw-cut leveling patch with base repair runs in the range of $6 to $15 per square foot+. These are industry baseline ranges for planning only — actual pricing depends on lot size, access, depth, and current market conditions. Get a site-specific quote.

Current Market Reality

Fixing birdbaths early is cheap insurance against the bigger problems they cause. A leveling patch over a sound base is inexpensive; letting a depression sit and saturate the base until it becomes a settling, potholing mess is not. Where the depression is from base settlement, paying to address the base — not just skim a patch over the top — is what keeps the spot from sinking again.

The Bottom Line

Birdbaths are depressions that hold standing water from settlement, poor compaction, or bad grading. They look minor but they feed cracking, potholing, and base damage, and Oregon's wet season keeps them full enough to matter. Level the low spots so water drains, address the base where it settled, and you stop a quiet problem before it gets loud. Cojo provides asphalt repair services across Oregon, including infrared leveling. Request an assessment and we will map your puddles after the next rain.