Questions are easy.
- How does a person decide how big & deep they should go? (Big across is one thing - that will probably be somewhat self-explanatory, but depth is another issue entirely. I'm guessing that many folks stop at a foot or two when 3 + woulda been much better)
- What are the best ways to build the sides, and why? Any tricks to know about? (We had a couple of spots where the hole was wider than we wanted to go. We framed a new wall using big wood stakes and flexible door skin plywood, then back-filled and poured a 3" deep concrete shelf. The shelf was not level. It tapered back a bit toward the outer wall)
- How deep/wide should shelves be? (Went about 16" deep with ours. I wish I'd gone a little deeper or made two shelves because you can see the liner)
- EPDM is heavy - have they thought about how to handle it? (Our 1000' sq. ft. sheet was 300 # and we were scratching our heads about how to move it around)
- Is old carpet a good substitute for the commercial underlayment? Where to get carpet? (We hit up a local flooring shop. They let me rummage in their dumpster. I came home with brand new carpet, not nasty old stuff.)
- How to maintain level while building/digging? Especially if you don't have a laser level. We borrowed a LL from work the last few months. Wow, what an improvement over long 2X4's and bubble levels.
- Build an overflow or just let it run out onto yard when it's raining?
- How to build so that raccoons/cats/ etc. are discouraged from entry.
- How to protect from herons/kingfishers.
- Some pump guidelines. (Our pumping power is way below the usual 'pond changeover every two hours' and we're doing fine)
- You could write a whole book on bio-filters :regular_waving_emot I'd be happy to send some pics of our 300 gal. tote filter.
- One thing that continues to elude me is how to build waterfalls that 1. Work 2. Don't look contrived 3. Don't leak
- Speaking of leaking, I'm experimenting with bentonite clay for one small cement vessel that has some pinhole leaks to the outside. I could see where the water was coming out but that's like a leak in a roof - not necessarily where the leak is starting. The clay seems to be working. I made a thick mud out of the clay with a 5 gallon bucket and a drill motor with stir attachment, then poured the mud into the vessel. If you just toss the clay in pond it sits there and turns into a gooey gelatinous heap.
- A chapter on sealing ideas (Dry-lok, Thoroseal, polyurethane, fish-safe etc.)
- Maybe talk about stonework a little bit. Our extreme pond makeover this summer has introduced me to mortaring, some basic cement work (forms, rebar, drilling holes for rebar, finding rocks that you can mortar to vertical surfaces, flagstone, etc.)
- Some ideas for transitioning from pond to foot traffic. From looking at pics posted here and other places, I feel that this is an area that people neglect (or can't visualize) during construction, and just sort of end up with whatever. We mortared some big flattish round rocks on top of the round rocks coming out of the pond, then dry-laid Cabinet Gorge flagstone up to the big round rocks. Got a half-ton of 3/8 - 0 crushed rock at a local gravel yard and swept it into the cracks between the flagstone and between the flagstone/round rock. Looks pretty snazzy.
- Is a bigger pond (1000 gal +) easier to maintain that a small one?
- How many fish?
- Snails too, or just fish?
- Plants and what's appropriate for your area. We were tricked by the pretty pictures of water lilies. Turns out they barely bloom in Western Washington, the little aphids climb all over the leaves, then they die.
- Some basic physics and gravity stuff. Like how a biofilter will syphon back to the pond unless you create an air break. Like how heavy water gets when you've already put a couple inches of it in the bottom of your new pond and you didn't pull the bigger folds out of the liner quickly enuf.
I ran across a lot more questions than these. If/when I think of them I'll be back.
