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More especially, you can spend a great deal of money. I think that's why I took up the sport. Besides, I had this wasted area about 10 feet deep and 30 feet long, viewed from the living room, where nothing interesting was going on except weeds. It needed something new…something wonderful…something better than the filled-in 6 foot pond my father had tried to build circa 1960 when he lived here. Pictures in magazines made the process look so easy -- I got inspired. Building the Pond:
First, for successful ponding, you need a hole in the ground and your hole has to retain water. I began with daddy's concrete shell. My mother had filled the shell with dirt and heathers. (She was always afraid someone would drown.) I dug it all out again during a fun-filled weekend. After numerous coats of waterproofing paint, much of the water I put in the old pond stays put. I should have spent money for a flexible plastic liner. At this point, I can gauge how well my waterproofing is going by the growth rate of two bergenias planted on opposite sides of the bridge-the one nearest the leak is twice as big as its brother on the other side.
To this central, shallow pond, I added two pre-formed plastic shells I bought at the home improvement store and brought home on the roof of my minivan. (This was a challenge.) So too was the job of digging out the appropriate holes, leveling the inserts and trying to make them fit together into a cohesive design statement. On the plus side, the commercial pond inserts hold water just fine. No leaks!
Now, how to get the water from one end to another? The "stream" that connects the ponds offers even more tricky challenges. The eastern one consists of a piece of radiator hose inserted in a hole drilled through the pond insert, which sends water onto a piece of PVC liner held in place with rocks. The western link required hammering out a shallow depression in the old concrete shell and gluing a piece of PVC liner in such a way that water runs over it and not around or through it. This was less successful. I did create a "stream" running under a bridge, but the water loss ratio is a bit too high here for me to brag loudly about the job.
If I had known what I was doing, I would have jack-hammered out the concrete shell and started from scratch with an EPDM liner. Even given the expense of EPDM, which costs more than plain old PVC, I probably would have been money ahead and I am certain that I would have had much less aggravation for me and for my long-suffering spouse. There are numerous books and magazines that tell you, in detail, how to excavate, level and lay out a pond. I recommend Water Gardens by the editors of Sunset Magazine (1997) as a generally good all-round place to start. The King County Library has videos to rent on the subject as well. But, I had jumped in without doing enough research, and I am too far gone to retreat now.
To finish my project, I added a pre-formed commercial waterfall piece to the southeast corner of the eastern pond. By running a ½ inch hose from the lowest level, western pond to a resin fish sculpture resting unsteadily on a rock above the waterfall, I recirculate my pond water. This is run by a submersible pump. More about this pump later-it's a whole episode in itself.
I surrounded my three pondlets with rocks of various sizes. Some are cemented into place with mortar and others await action. One garden writer I recall speaks of the "dreaded necklace effect" and that's just what I have, although I have varied the size, shape and type of rock somewhat to try and disguise it. Around and behind the rocks I planted low groundcover plants like thyme, creeping jenny, sempervivum and sedum. After a few years, they began to creep into the water itself, which is kind of cool looking and helps disguise the hard black outline.
The final parts of my hardscape include a gravel path, wooden bridge and small seating area with a lovely Adirondack chair where I can sit and watch my fish. Of course, I don't have a lot of time for fish-watching, because once you construct a pond, you have to maintain it. The next episodes of this saga will tell you about plants for ponds, pond care and feeding, and the critters that enjoy it along with me.
Hortsense: Managing plant problems with Integrated Pest Management
