tbendl
T
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It's looking great and clearing up nicely!
Michey1st's Maryland Pond Upgrade Thread
- Thread starter michey1st
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Thanks, T! There's a ton of clay/construction debris at the bottom still. This weekend while we are out working, i'm going to do the whole quilt batting thing to try and get a handle on it. Stir it all up with da feets and hope it makes it's way towards the pump ;-)
tbendl
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In other words you're going to play in the water and call it "cleaning".. Hehe I get it.
It's called multitasking!!!!
Here's what our edge treatment will look like (minus all the exposed liner, lol). When complete, we will bring up the water level so there are rocks above and below the waterline. After backfilling and hiding the excess liner, We plan to place a course of beefier flat stones on top and partially on terra firma to hide the liner edge.
Today we have cooler weather and no rain in the forecast, so hope to make more progress (we both took the day off in anticipation).
Today we have cooler weather and no rain in the forecast, so hope to make more progress (we both took the day off in anticipation).
Aaaaaand, here's a few of the flowers & critters out and about the yard:
These butterflies are all over our water willow. Here is one taking a rest on my bee balm (apologies for the overexposed pic!):
Shirley's Poppy -- my first foray into the wonderful word of annual seeds. Ever planted Poppy seeds before? they are SOOOOOOOOOOO tiny. I planted way too many in my patch of soil and have been thinning them out little by little, but i'm kind of sick of doing it, so they are on their own from now on. Plus, some sort of weed holding up the bloom. Thanks, buddy!
One of our resident chipmunks eyeing me dubiously. I watch him drink from the bog every morning.
Somehow, this hydrangea bloom escaped being munched on by deer last year (I got 3 plants as a freebie from a coworker 2 years ago as she was getting rid of them). These guys set their buds on old wood. The first year, the cold zapped them to oblivion. This is my first (and likely only) bloom this year out of the three plants as the deer did a number on them last fall. Undecided as to whether I should keep 'em as the chance of blooms is so tenuous.
These butterflies are all over our water willow. Here is one taking a rest on my bee balm (apologies for the overexposed pic!):
Shirley's Poppy -- my first foray into the wonderful word of annual seeds. Ever planted Poppy seeds before? they are SOOOOOOOOOOO tiny. I planted way too many in my patch of soil and have been thinning them out little by little, but i'm kind of sick of doing it, so they are on their own from now on. Plus, some sort of weed holding up the bloom. Thanks, buddy!
One of our resident chipmunks eyeing me dubiously. I watch him drink from the bog every morning.
Somehow, this hydrangea bloom escaped being munched on by deer last year (I got 3 plants as a freebie from a coworker 2 years ago as she was getting rid of them). These guys set their buds on old wood. The first year, the cold zapped them to oblivion. This is my first (and likely only) bloom this year out of the three plants as the deer did a number on them last fall. Undecided as to whether I should keep 'em as the chance of blooms is so tenuous.
Love your pond. I think you were very wise in taking the time to dig the pond the size you really wanted now, instead of later. Quite a difference! I wish I would have done that. I couldn't envision the pond until I got the water in. Some how what I saw in my mind isn't what I ended up with. ha!
If you are concerned about the berm in the back being washed away until the plants get established, what I did was make a rock garden. Then when the plants filled in, I started removing the rocks. I now just have a couple of rocks which I use as a path through my plants.
Have you determined your overflow yet? The picture below is of my overflow. It is behind the rock on the left side of the iris. Behind this rock is extra liner that I can raise or lower, depending on the height of the water I want in the pond. The liner extends beyond the edge of the pond a little, down a slight slope, so that the water doesn't end up behind the liner and the pond. The extra water goes under the bridge and into the yard.
If you are concerned about the berm in the back being washed away until the plants get established, what I did was make a rock garden. Then when the plants filled in, I started removing the rocks. I now just have a couple of rocks which I use as a path through my plants.
Have you determined your overflow yet? The picture below is of my overflow. It is behind the rock on the left side of the iris. Behind this rock is extra liner that I can raise or lower, depending on the height of the water I want in the pond. The liner extends beyond the edge of the pond a little, down a slight slope, so that the water doesn't end up behind the liner and the pond. The extra water goes under the bridge and into the yard.
Brilliant! Ponders are so creative!
@DrellDrell this is what I meant when I said you could hide your overflow in your rock edge, although I envisioned a piece of piping. But this is also very clever, if you have an area that slopes enough to carry the water away from the pond.
Thanks, Cas! I've got an idea about how to handle the overflow, but until I get all the edges rocked and have started on the backfilling, it's not really going to come together (it's perfect in my mind, though, lol!). Here's an older overview pic:
I want to keep it away from the lowest part of my yard, which in this picture is in the top, right corner, which is the area that will have the highest berm. I have a sizable dropoff at the back of my property (right side of the photo but out of view) and the part of that hill where the pond would eventually drain from the top right is prone to erosion. I'm thinking of doing something where the floating log is (bottom right) in a small channel between the lower pond and the middle pond and fill it with 3-5" cobble which I already have. The trick will be how to get it to work, which I think I will figure out once we've got the edging in place and have started backfilling. I'm also thinking in 1 or two corners where I have lots of extra liner, digging out a low section beyond the rock ledge for a shallow birdbath, but not quite sure how that will work yet. Kinda taking it as I think of it ;-)
Near that potential overflow spot, but a little bit up near the bottom-most water lily (around 3:00 in the photo) is also where I was toying with future expansion of an out-of-pond skimmer. I know it's not opposite my waterfall, but it is where gunk already always ends up due to prevailing winds so I think it will work. Just gotta plan accordingly!
Really liking the idea of shoring the hill up with rocks... we won't have enough to do an honest to goodness retaining wall, but we should be OK to sporadically place them. In a perfect world, i'd dig in some strategically placed boulders, but don't think that will be happening this year. I'm also thinking instead of one big arse berm, breaking it up in to something that's 2 levels with a swale in between. That will give the water a chance to pool up instead of running down and also offer a level surface for walking, planting, etc. That swale area will have yummy, yummy compost dug in to make it extra absorby.
Aaaaaand, speaking of copious extra liner, wanted to hear y'all's thoughts. On any given side, we will have between 3 and 5 feet of extra liner to deal with. No cutzies because I want to leave room for future expansion (lol). It's A LOT to fold, tuck and cover with dirt especially given we are working with pretty tall berms on 2 sides... I don't want to destabalize anything by digging down into our packed clay too much. I know the generally accepted practice is to fold it and tuck excess liner on the outside the pond, but wanted to know if it is frowned upon to fold it INSIDE the pond, snug it up behind the rocks and cover that gap with coping stones. Possibly good idea or a path fraught with misery?
I want to keep it away from the lowest part of my yard, which in this picture is in the top, right corner, which is the area that will have the highest berm. I have a sizable dropoff at the back of my property (right side of the photo but out of view) and the part of that hill where the pond would eventually drain from the top right is prone to erosion. I'm thinking of doing something where the floating log is (bottom right) in a small channel between the lower pond and the middle pond and fill it with 3-5" cobble which I already have. The trick will be how to get it to work, which I think I will figure out once we've got the edging in place and have started backfilling. I'm also thinking in 1 or two corners where I have lots of extra liner, digging out a low section beyond the rock ledge for a shallow birdbath, but not quite sure how that will work yet. Kinda taking it as I think of it ;-)
Near that potential overflow spot, but a little bit up near the bottom-most water lily (around 3:00 in the photo) is also where I was toying with future expansion of an out-of-pond skimmer. I know it's not opposite my waterfall, but it is where gunk already always ends up due to prevailing winds so I think it will work. Just gotta plan accordingly!
Really liking the idea of shoring the hill up with rocks... we won't have enough to do an honest to goodness retaining wall, but we should be OK to sporadically place them. In a perfect world, i'd dig in some strategically placed boulders, but don't think that will be happening this year. I'm also thinking instead of one big arse berm, breaking it up in to something that's 2 levels with a swale in between. That will give the water a chance to pool up instead of running down and also offer a level surface for walking, planting, etc. That swale area will have yummy, yummy compost dug in to make it extra absorby.
Aaaaaand, speaking of copious extra liner, wanted to hear y'all's thoughts. On any given side, we will have between 3 and 5 feet of extra liner to deal with. No cutzies because I want to leave room for future expansion (lol). It's A LOT to fold, tuck and cover with dirt especially given we are working with pretty tall berms on 2 sides... I don't want to destabalize anything by digging down into our packed clay too much. I know the generally accepted practice is to fold it and tuck excess liner on the outside the pond, but wanted to know if it is frowned upon to fold it INSIDE the pond, snug it up behind the rocks and cover that gap with coping stones. Possibly good idea or a path fraught with misery?
I like that idea!
I know what you mean about needing to have some of the rock edging done before you really know what you want. I didn't put the overflow in until the year after I built it. I didn't even think about it until we had a lot of rain and my skimmer wouldn't work because the water was too high. But what was nice about waiting a year is I knew where and how the water was flowing outside my pond, so I knew where to put an overflow in without water from the yard going into the pond.
Michey - how is your pond after all that rain we had last night? I think we got hit with 4.5 inches. Yikes!
Hey Logan! Water level went up around 3 inches, I'd say. We have been purposefully keeping it a bit low while we work on the rock edging. So much for that, lol! All in all, we fared ok, though! Super heavy downpours followed by breaks of nothing or light drizzle. My rain barrel has been perpetually full for the last 2 weeks.... oy vey!
Have you been making progress on your pond with the kiddos in all this nonsense?!?
Have you been making progress on your pond with the kiddos in all this nonsense?!?
PROGRESS! We figured out how to deal with our edge treatment! Of course, it took a few hours of futzing to come up with it, and will need to be tweaked as we come across the "ideal rocks" in our pallets. But thar she blows!
Basically, we folded, tucked, rolled and crammed the extra liner in the back, but left a lip sticking up behind the rock ledge. Then, that lip got folded OVER the rock ledge and covered with a big coping rock. That rock overlaps onto the soil in the back, and we will randomly place river rock over any gaps of liner showing. We will also place a few stones onto the dirt to diminish the necklace effect. Once we get plants snugged up and growing along the edge, i'm pretty sure it's going to look fantastic.
Here's some overall shots as of close-of-business today (complete with goldie photobomb):
Note that we still need to backfill more dirt, except that I think we will use some planting soil and compost for the final layers.
And finally, a visitor that greeted me when I got home from work today:
Basically, we folded, tucked, rolled and crammed the extra liner in the back, but left a lip sticking up behind the rock ledge. Then, that lip got folded OVER the rock ledge and covered with a big coping rock. That rock overlaps onto the soil in the back, and we will randomly place river rock over any gaps of liner showing. We will also place a few stones onto the dirt to diminish the necklace effect. Once we get plants snugged up and growing along the edge, i'm pretty sure it's going to look fantastic.
Here's some overall shots as of close-of-business today (complete with goldie photobomb):
Note that we still need to backfill more dirt, except that I think we will use some planting soil and compost for the final layers.
And finally, a visitor that greeted me when I got home from work today:
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very nice!