I love seeing your construction pictures, so I thought I'd share.

I've been planning for about 5 months now, and we finally got it all together to start the dig. The setup will be an overflowing urn/filter ( it's 3 ft high and 28" diameter, about 75 gallons)



down a stream, under a boardwalk bridge to the 12'x16' pond.

Before:


The layout:


What's done so far:


The urn will stand at the top of the stairs near where the yellow handled shovel is (when I find out what the mystery pipe is and remove it). The stream will flow between the stairs and the fence down to the pond. We'll have to put a flat boardwalk bridge over the stream in order to get in and out of the gate. This is the only place I figure the whole thing can be put so we can enjoy it from the sun room and not worry about the septic tank and drain field.

It took Jim 4 hours to dig that much. Very easy digging, we just have to take time to haul out the dirt to the back 40 a wheelbarrow at a time. Each trip takes about as much time to haul as it does to dig. For perspective, that bucket is 2 foot high.

I did suggest to him that we dig the whole 1 foot shelf first, then the 2 foot shelf, then the 3 foot section, but he thought it'd be better to do the deeper part first. I knew he'd be digging that deeper part over and over as the other dirt fell in, but he was digging, so I wasn't going to stop him.

I ordered the liner from Best Nest. and got in in 1 day, and cheaper than anything I could find around her locally(shipping included). I also didn't have to lug all 142 lbs of it in and out of the car, just rolled the box end over end from the door.

Two monster tree roots have changed the layout of the shelves a bit. I think we'll just pad over them and use them as the edges of the shelf.

We dug and hauled on Saturday, then Sunday was lots of rain and Mother's Day with the in-laws. Monday I researched rock prices (anyone in SE Michigan have an inexpensive source?), and today I started putting all the perennials that have come up so nicely in my stream bed into pots for later transplant to the pond surrounds.

And, I discovered the mystery pipe. See my post, What did I find? for pictures. I think I may just chop it off and see if the house doesn't sink afterwards.

More to follow.

Looking good!! I am liking the layout a lot! Very jealous about your soil and digging conditions. Mine is all stone here to dig through!

My only suggestion may be to skip putting shelves in it. The more I read about the shelves, the more a pain in the butt I believe they are. If I had to to it over again I would skip the shelves and simply use milk crates or the like after it was completed to make individual shelves for plants.

Just my 2 cents, but over all you guys are getting a lot of work done! Keep the pic's coming.....and cut that mystery pipe off! ;)

Derrick

Thanks for the pictures Linda. That is looking great! You picked a really nice spot, it is going to look awesome when you are done. Keep that hubby digging and post more when you can! Have fun :D P.S. I have no shelves in my current pond but I am going to have a shelf on the end of then new pond for sure. My ponds are too deep to use milk crates and I don't want the new pond to have that "cavernous hole" feel of the last one :angry:

I prefer shelves myself. I just wish the three levels of my pond were flat but the builders made them more gradual. You know what that means - me sliding down the pond liner slope and trying to keep from falling in which I've done a few times.

It's a lot of hard work to make a pond but also so exciting! I miss that. I don't know if I'll ever have the chance to make another pond myself.

Oh Robyn, I would trade you right now! All this trying to get it right stuff is killing me! I wish I could have all the money back that I have wasted in the last year on this pond stuff! And....the last thing I want to do is build another pond after doing it last year, LOL I guess it is a little bit exciting though! As long as THIS one works out better.

So nothing was done last week because of rain and visiting in-laws. But Friday we got rocks!


That's a half ton of large rocks, 3 tons of small, and 6 tons of medium sized rocks.

They look much prettier when wet (and cleaned)


I dug some on Saturday and put up a level line. Discovered that the south end is about a foot lower than the north end. It sure didn't look like that just looking at the land. So I told myself, I'll just build up the south end with more rocks and dirt. I finished digging this morning and put in the skimmer where it'll need to be, and took a break to survey what I had accomplished.


Looking at it told me I wasn't done. I had planned to leave the big roots in and use them as the edges to the shelves. But think about what roots do to sidewalks when they grow....what would it do to a liner? Probably raise it above water level and then I'd be in big trouble. Also looking at that skimmer sticking way up like it is, I see a lot of work in building up that side. And there wouldn't be a drop from the stream to the pond, so I wouldn't be able to safely use two pieces of liner.


So back to the drawing board. I dug out the two big roots. First one I chopped off with a lopper that'll cut up to two inches.

Next one wasn't so easy.


Since I don't own a chain saw, I got ingenious. I dug out the side near the edge of the pond and got my Roto-Zip out and cut through it with that! The other end just took my lifting the whole root up and over and it broke off. When those two big roots were out of the way, I completed the dig. I'll be lowering the skimmer tomorrow to the new level that doesn't take raising the low end of the pond. I started on the stream bed and called it quits about 5pm. Not bad for 6 hours of work.

Nice Job! That is looking really good :)

Your new pond is coming right along. Keep that DH digging. :)
Nice rocks too! Only true ponders would drool over real rocks and not the ring kind. ;)
The pond that I build (someday) will have a few shelves. I am tired of putting stuff on top of rocks and bricks. I would feel more secure with a shelf knowing that whatever is on it is less likely to get knocked over and for me, would look better too. JMO

Oh did I say that I really like your rocks? :rolleyes: :)

It's looking good! It's good that you got the roots out of there; they would just cause future problems. It looks like your pond is going to have a lot of rocks!

What's a Roto-Zip?

Robyn you don't know what a roto zip is? :o ;)
I bet if it had scales on it you would know what it is. :lol:

Here you go: http://www.rotozip.com/SiteLanding_Page.htm

Robyn, I'm going to line each of the vertical walls with the medium rocks, and I have a 40 ft long stream to line and rockscape. Any extra medium rocks will be flower bed edging. Extra small rocks will go in the rock beds I have around the foundation of my house in the back yard. Those rocks always seem to mysteriously disappear.

A Roto-Zip looks like a drill except it cuts with the tip and the side of the bit. Kinda like a saw and drill combo. Really nifty tool.

Looks like a good start so far keep the pic coming.

Thank y'all for the compliments and encouragement. I don't think I'll join in on the shelf versus non-shelf argument except to say I'm already thankful for the shelves and I even put in an extra small shelf in the middle so that I could use them as steps.

Yesterday I dug some more stream and ran into tree root central. Looking up, I saw why. That area is in the center of the drip line of the two big trees in the back yard. Lots of little roots to cut out one by one with the hand pruner. Then, I went to the store to look at pond plumbing stuff, mostly avoiding working as much as possible since I was sick of digging and cutting.

Today I made lots of progress. First off I added another 4 inches or so to the width of the center deep part of the hole. Found the underground feeder line to the electricity in the shed. What's it doing way over here? Luckily I didn't damage it at all. I thought it was a root at first until I got ready to pull it out and found it was plastic, not wood. I just reburied it and went on my way. Then I combed the whole inside of the pond hole, looking for any stray objects that I didn't want permanently under the liner. I lined the whole thing with cardboard....got a bunch of heavy cardboard from the ends of newspaper rolls.


After the cardboard, I put down the underliner.

You ask why both cardboard and underliner?
I found lots of scary things in that hole I dug. Glass, a corroded battery, barbed wire, a horse shoe, and old pipe. All things that make me want to be extra careful to protect the liner from the ground.

Then I wrangled the 142 lb box of liner out into the yard and laid it out to see what I had bought.

That sure looked like a lot of liner for my little ol' pond

Then I had to wait and wait and wait for hubby and the neighbors to get home to help carry the liner to where it belonged. We got it in place during the first few drops of the rain shower that came along to help fill it up. Here it is 5 rocks down, 10 tons to go :o

LOL, I wasn't intending to start an arguement (for a change ;) )

I have shelves built in mine, which looks to be a similar size. Sometimes they are convenient, but I find most of the time they end up being either a bit too shallow for what I want there, or a bit too deep, or a bit too narrow for the pot to sit securely, or a bit of dirt has settled and now it doesn't sit even. Just annoying little things. If I were doing it again I would go with a plain hole and add specific shelving for specific plants.

Your pond is coming right along though! :D Wee need a constant fix of pictures!

Derrick

Derrick,
Those are all things that plagued me as I was covering up the dirt. I did a lot of second guessing. Are the shelves deep enough? Are they wide enough? Is the lowest level wide enough to accommodate the rocks on the sides, but not too wide to make the shelf too narrow? That's why I went back and widened the deepest part just before I covered it all up. :unsure:

But then if I keep up being such a perfectionist, my pond will never get finished. :( And I want a pond, hopefully complete in the next few weeks!

LOL, I'm sure it will all work out to your satisfaction. I think if I hadn't decided my pond needed to be completed in a day and had actually made a plan instead of deciding what to do as I was doing it, I could have/would have corrected a few of my issues. I definitely would have had my shelves wider than they are.

Oh well, I am actually trying to PLAN the next pond! hahaha....don't know if I will have time to break ground on it this summer as I have a lot of yard projects on the go, but if not then next summer for sure. :D

Derrick

Your pond looks so awesome Linda! Great job. I am loving your pictures, since I am starting a similar sized project soon, you are inspiring me to get at it! Keep on posting those pictures!

Oh Linda, we don't really argue on here well, then again maybe we did. :lol:
Everyone has their own way of doing things and some of us are really, really different but we love them anyway. ;) :)
Did you spray the lawn to kill the grass before you (the DH) started the big dig?

Tia

Your pond is coming along nicely! It's fun to build ponds (too bad I won't be building any more).

Nope, just started digging through the lawn. Oh, and to set the record straight, DH has only dug what was done on day one. The rest was little old me! I've had this whole week off of work and I've been putting it to good use.

Nothing to report for today except for a tour of all the plumbing stores in town. Why is it that the big box stores don't carry 3" solid core pvc, only foam core? They have solid 1", 2", and 4".:huh: I had to go to a plumbing specialty store to get 3".

It was too cold to work outside until about 3:30 today, and then I had lost all ambition. I thought I could get my stream liner locally, but it was too expensive(.90 a ft). I ordered it from Best Nest(.56 a foot, shipping included). Should have looked earlier this morning and then I'd have it tomorrow. As it is, I'll have to wait until Tuesday :ph43r:

Go Linda, go Linda :)

Tia

Hi Linda, I have heard that streams are the most difficult to build.
Most people find they re-do the stream part multiple times before
they are satisfied with the results. That is compounded buy the
fact they tend to leak after the ground settles. So post lots of pics
since I will be trying my hand at it this summer. :rolleyes:
Pond build sure is looking great, good work. Don't you wish you had
another week off to finish.
Fm3

Derrick

Next time you build a pond and are worried about the shifting soil in shelves, you might want to consider stabilizing the soil immediately after you finish the dig. Mix up a loose mixture of portland cement and sand (3 sand to 1 cement) and dash it on the vertical surfaces with a wide brush. When this hardens, it will stabilize the soil and help prevent shifting and collapse.

Don

You were reffering to me weren't you???? Dont deny it I KNOW you were ;) LOL
that's okay, every neighbourhood needs a crazy pond lady :lol:

That's a good idea Don! I'm actually thinking next years project is going to be a partially in ground(2 feet) and partially above ground (2 feet). The above ground will be constructed from pressure treated 4 x 4's. I am currently thinking of having it so that turtles could live in it as well (I would love to have some turtles). Have been researching what types of turtles live here naturally and seeing what type of environment I would need to create as I would want it to mimic their natural habitat as closely as possible.

This means I will be picking the brains of you turtle people for quite some time to come!!! hahaha

Derrick

:rolleyes:

Tia

"Crazy" may be a little harsh. I would say more "quirky"! :P

Derrick

Hey Derrick, I see you are planning a half in half out pond????? I am not going to do that again. I just wasn't happy with it, I mean it is nice to have a place to sit etc, but don't forget that top two feet will freeze more solid and quicker cause it won't have the insulation of the ground :-( Just a though for you to think about! If the top half freezes quickly, it will make your bottom two feet freeze quicker too. That's just my 2 cents worth anyhow :rolleyes:

Question for you Linda...what size liner did you use?

KK,
The liner's 20'x25'. Hole is 12'x16', 36" at deepest. I have a generous 2 ft or so extra around the edges of the hole right now, but I'll have to build up the low side a little. Probably could have gone to 14' wide with this liner.

Thanks Linda! I am really liking your pond design and the liner I just ordered is exactley the same size. I need to go to five feet deep though so I couldn't be as big as yours. I have totally NO vision when it comes to this kind of thing, so at least looking at yours and having the same size liner, I can at least picture it, LOL Thanks!!!

KK, I'm glad I'm not in the far northern tundra like you are. I can see why you built your pond tent. Doing all this work to only see it for 2 or 3 months a year is probably too much.

Anyway, speaking of work, I did a little more. Finished stacking the rocks around the lower level. That is tedious work, dry stacking rocks so they fit and don't want to roll down the hill. It's like a 3d jigsaw puzzle where there aren't really any pieces that fit. You have to make it up as you go. I used great stuff to glue the rocks to the liner and help fill in some of the gaps. I know it's white, but I'm sure that pretty soon everything will be some shade of green. :D



In case you haven't noticed, the skimmer that I got is inside the liner. No holes to cut and risk leaks. Got it from It's Paradise at Home, in Oklahoma. It is the absolute cheapest place to get skimmers and filter falls that I could find. And after all, they're just plastic boxes. Why are they so ridiculously expensive? And that black thing is an intake cage. This skimmer also sucks from the bottom of it's box so all the intake is not just from the top of the water, making better water circulation.

Ok, back to the stone quarry. I'm real good at what my Dad used to call avoidance behavior. That's doing something that you can make up a reason why it needed to be done now instead of doing what you should have been doing. For example, keeping you all updated instead of being outside moving more rocks. :D See ya!

OMG Linda! That is amazing! I would NEVER have the patience to do that with rocks. I am only going to have the liner and no rocks, I will have some to hold the liner in place but that's it. Your pond is going to look so awesome once it is up and running and the water is clear, those rocks are going to look amazing! You are doing so much work!

Well, I"m done for the day, and it sure looks like there was a lot of progress. Started filling it up with water! I'm too impatient and I needed the water to weigh down the liner and show me where level is so I can build up the low end.
125 gallons
150 gallons


450 gallons

525 gallons

835 gallons

and the finish for today 1010 gallons

At this speed, it's taking about 200 gallons per inch, so I'm probably going to end up with about 1500 gallons. A lot smaller than I'd figured. The rocks took up about 500 gallons worth of space! I knew they'd take up space, but I was afraid to dig bigger and end up with not enough liner. Oh well.

There's still lots more rock work to do around the edges. Then we have the plumbing, the stream, and the filter to go. Think it can be done tomorrow before we go to my BIL's for a Memorial Day picnic? :blink:

Linda great work, looking good, where is your filter?

fm3

Thanks Froggy. As you're looking at the last picture, the filter would be over your right shoulder. About 40 feet up the hill to that overflowing urn I showed on my first post. The urn is the filter. It goes urn/filter, stream, then pond.

As J.J. would say: "LOOKING GOOOOOD!"

:D

Hi Linda,
Nice job you are doing there! :) I can't wait to see the whole thing when you're done!
The "in progress" photos are great to see. (giving me some great ideas for my next pond!)
The rock work on the pond walls is going to look awsome.
Are you going to keep the horizontal surfaces beneath the surface free of rock?

Also, just curious how you measured the water going in ... with a meter, or a stopwatch?

PG

Thanks for the pictures! That is looking super awesome :D Want me to send you my pond outfit so you can get right in there??? :lol: :lol: Do you have pond fish already or are you starting out fresh? What kind of fish/animals are you going to add? Good Job! My liner should be here by Thursday. Did you have to wash your liner?? I am getting so excited to start on my new pond with seeing your pictures!

PG, That was the plan. I figure they'll get covered with fuzz real soon and I've heard all those little rocks are hard to clean.

I'm using water that's been through the water softener because of VERY high iron and magnesium content in my water. Anything that gets touched by the straight well water is coated with orange and the magnesium comes in small black chunks. The softener has a dial on it that tells how much longer until it needs recharging so I've been using that to gauge the water going to the pond. I think I may have to add some calcium or something back into the water to buffer the Ph. Anyone know for sure?

KK, Thanks for the offer, but I don't have to dive as far as you do to get to the bottom. I might want waders when it gets colder, but the water feels great today. B)
I don't have any fish yet, but the plan is to start with about 5 goldfish. But I do have 2 water lilies that I've been rearing in a large trash can. Got them from Wally World about 2 months ago.
The liner was fine as it came...no washing needed.

Ok, so for today, I set up a temporary water circulation to skim and prevent stagnation and mosquito larvae.



Built up the sides a bit and added a few more rocks, then decided to call it quits because I'm getting sun burnt by all those severe thunderstorms we're supposed to get today. Should have covered up. :ph43r:

KK, my final picture for today shows why I need a skimmer. See how much it's already caught?



It's Memorial Day, so we had a few old planes fly over. I'm in the flight path for planes that want to go around Detroit, and directly south of us is the Yankee Air Museum. Today was only a B-25 bomber and a C-47 skytrain. On other occasions we've seen their B-17, Japanese Zeros, P-47's, a Fokker Tri-plane, Ford Tri-Motor, and P-51 Mustangs. DH identified most of these, although I know a zero, a tri-motor, and the Red Baron's plane when I see them :) Nice day for sitting out on the deck and enjoying the day.