New Pond Build Questions.

[capewind]

shhh... hubby doesnt want any pictures posted til the project is complete, but I was out on an errand and grabbed a couple to show the two areas that *I* planted.

On the left of the pic, near the top of the "pile of rocks" you can just make out a plant poking out ... with some scrap liner (so the loam wont get into the pond), he made a small planting area, that's "ice plant" which will drape a bit over the rocks ... I also put a bit of water celery at the base of the riocks, so it will get between the rocks as it grows....


The higher rocks behind the pickerel weed was done that way to meet the grade behind the pond ... pickerel weed is supposed to be planted at a rate of one plant, per 2 square feet ... I only allowed 1 sq foot per plant so it will fill in fast (and then I'll go thin it, and bring the extras back to our pond) ... not planted yet, but adding some starts of water cress into some pockets hubby left for it at the waterfall (water cress does best near moving water) ...

 

[HTH]

Capwind I like your rockwork. Coming from the guy who hates rocks that means something.

 

[javabob]

That looks great capewind. My wife loves watercress, I can't wait to grow some. She's the more frugal one
so if she can eat something grown in the pond it'll help my cause, lol.

 

[capewind]

Will pass the compliments along to hubby. My idea of DOING rock work is to TELL hubby, nope, dont like that one, or I do like it LOL. This wasnt the type of rock he wanted to use. He wanted to use the same style rock he used on this project, but the client wanted the same type that is at our house ...

 

[mgmine]

How deep should the shelf that holds the gravel be? What plants would do well in gravel?

 

[capewind]

How deep should the shelf that holds the gravel be? What plants would do well in gravel?

Depth will depend on your plans for plants ... anything that you can put into a pot to put into the pond can be directly planted in gravel. If you wanted nothing but small grasses or iris' you could "get away with" only 6-8" of gravel ... if you wanted something super agressive, 12" would be better. In a "real pond bog" most tend to target a depth of 18" but this isnt anything more than an oversize "pot" ...

On that left "bed" I intentionally put pickerel weed there, so it can just take over that spot. I thought they would work well with the higher area of rocks that seperate from one of their planting beds ...The project did NOT include plants, but this is such a great client, I robbed our pond for plants for them. She doesnt want to spend a lot of time messing with pond plants, so I went with something I liked, had at our house, and would work for the spot, and when they get crowded, I just plan to go thin them (no charge) to put back into our pond(s). The other area is more of a hodge podge to try to put in variety ... A lot will depend on what YOU like, and how your yard is landscaped too, to what would work best. Other than possibly lilies (not planted in this type of area), try to avoid tropical plants. You want things that will be hardy for your area.

 

[javabob]

Here is the latest picture. It's been raining here in Minnesota every day so not much time to dig.

We got it down to almost 3 feet. Was hoping to do some fathers day digging but we had torrential
downpoors yesterday and now the pond has about a foot of water in it.

I didn't get a picture but we're getting alot of errosion on the sides of the pond walls from the rain and it's
freaking me out. The liner comes in on Tuesday so hopefully we can get the last foot and the bogs dug out
by doing some afterwork digging.

 

[mgmine]

What size is your pond going to be and how long has it taken you so far? What size liner did you order? I hope to start digging mine soon but like you I won't have a liner until after the hole is dug. I don't want to be limited to a pond size by a liner. I plan of laying it out and then digging it. What ever size it ends up is the size I will get for the liner.

 

[nohandles]

Our new pond is 7500 gallons here in Norther ohio. I have an external 5000 gph, a 2500 in the pond skimmer and a 3000 under water that will have a UV cut into the hose. One of the tricks I've always used it to increase the outlet side to reduce the force into the falls area. all the pumps go from a 1 1/2 outlet stepped up to 2 inch for the falls area. The 5000 has 2 entry points into a manifold I built out of PVC with 7 exits under the lave rock filter. With 10500 going in it works perfect coming over the falls. For the 5000 external it will run during the winter. I found a fake rock on the net that covers the pump and the bubbler. The rock blends into the area really nice and accents the other smaller rocks I used.

 

[javabob]

What size is your pond going to be and how long has it taken you so far? What size liner did you order? I hope to start digging mine soon but like you I won't have a liner until after the hole is dug. I don't want to be limited to a pond size by a liner. I plan of laying it out and then digging it. What ever size it ends up is the size I will get for the liner.

Well the part that is going to be 4 feet deep will be 14' x 16'. I'm going to add some faux bogs / big planting area that capewind showed earlier in the post. I ordered a 25 x 30 liner.