Articles
Our Garden Pond
The garden has never been planned in its entirety, it has just developed into what it is by adding to and changing what was already there and this will continue.
I always wanted a pond in the garden but like most people would not have one because we had youngsters in the house. It was eventually kick started after my son and me built a pond for a friend.
To my surprise a couple of days later I came home from work to see Chris digging the hole.
Over the next few days we boith got stuck in and finally finished it. This was probably the biggest change in the garden for years because I am not a keen gardener. We decided about 8 feet x 6 feet would be big enough, but the more we dug the more buried treasure we found, well ok then junk. This is Chris talinkg a well ewarned rest. The pond actually ended up about 14 feet long x 8 feet wide.
These are just a few pictures of the development. The liner is in, time to fill it up.
The basic pond filled and with a very basic temporary crossing until we sort out a proper bridge.
Now flagged around the edges with a newly built bridge. The bridge is built from wooden fence posts and decking boards. It was designed and built by Chris and as you will notice most things are, Dad supervises it's much easier.
Next up was a waterfall: The first attempt.
The waterfall has gone through many changes and nothing seemed to be just what we wanted, we tried various options and decided to make a trough. It is basically a small water garden fed by the pond filter with a controlled overflow into the pond. You may wonder why the garden is in such a mess again in this picture. It is because we had decided on another major change, a Garden Railway. You can follow the setting up of this in, the Model Railways, Garden Railway pages.
The pond is established even though overgrown with plants, so we had to thin them oiut.
At first sight there may not seem to be any obvious changes in this picture but if you look at the right hand side of the bridge you will see that it has been extended. This was necessary because of the garden railway track
Herons and cats are the biggest problems when you have fish in your pond. There are many deterrents on the market, which include nets and decoy herons; I have found that decoy herons don't work and during spring they actually encourage other herons to come down to mate. Can you imagine lots of baby plastic herons everywhere? I think nets spoil the appearance of ponds and if not fixed properly herons actually lift them up to get underneath. As with cats the biggest deterrent is noise, and the answer is quite simple really, just sit by your pond 24 hours a day and make a noise when you see them approaching (hopefully you will have understanding neighbours). Like a lot of people with ponds I am looking into various options and having read an article in a water garden magazine about a scarecrow device for scaring herons and cats without harming them, I thought that sounds just the job so I ordered one. Oh by the way we have pensioned off the decoy heron
.No not that, it's the wrong kind, this one is a Drivall Scarecrow.
Originally written 17/03/20007
Monday 23rd April 2007 - I looked out of my bedroom window to see a heron with a fish in its bill. Monday after work I put the net back on - need I say more than the 'Drivall Scarecrow' has turned out to be another very expensive failure, and has been relieved of its duties. Maybe I should have used the other type it probably would have done the job better, oh well as they say back to the drawing board. Wednesday 16th May 2007
More bad news for the Drivall Scarecrow - when I bought my scarecrow I told a friend about it, so they bought one. I was informed that a heron had also invaded their pond, it was seen through the window taking a fish while the scarecrow was actually spraying and the heron completely ignoring it. They have now netted the pond again. Yet another failure for the rivall Scarecrow.
Some time has passed without any real changes to the pond but you can see that bridge and nets have been re-built, if you want to know why, please follow the Bridge article in this section. There is a link at the end of this article. As you can see from the following photographs things have been changed but work is ongoing.
Oh by the way you may have noticed that we have pensioned off the decoy heron
The reason that the trough for the waterfall is empty is because there are cracks and leaks in it and it need repairing. The filter normally runs into the trough to feed the waterfall hence its untidy condition. Being winter it will be done when the weather improves and the pebbles and plants can be put back and the filter tidied up. The same also goes for the state of the garden. The trough is now ready to be re-planted, and as you can see the filter has been transfereed to the left of the pond, This is to make it easier with the cleaning etc,
Showing the empty trough, the filter and UV clarifier with the mains electricty box all waiting to be tidied up
Tidying up is on the go.
The trough is now filled and planted again, just got to wait for it to grow again and then the usual tidy up in the garden in Spring 2015.
Updated November 2014
