So, a new pond…

After a childhood spent staring in ditches at insects and fish my husband decided that he wants a new pond. I am happy to agree since it’s the single best thing you can do for wildlife in your garden. Having just bought a house with a decent-sized garden we have the space and after some discussion and web searching I came back from a work trip away to find a hole in the lawn…

Clearly the kids were pretty excited at the prospect too, so a further morning of work and we have a gaping hole, with multiple levels and a maximum depth of 75 cm (just deep enough for us to grow water lilies – my passion).

The turves removed from the lawn have all been stacked by the compost heaps, according to Bob Flowerdew, our guru of gardening, they make a fine potting compost when allowed to break down for 6 months or so. This is a step beyond my normal chuck it in and see what happens approach to composting, so let’s see if it works

Anyway, hole dug, it was time to add the liner. Possibly we’ll regret it later but being a bit lazy, and discovering our ground is mostly clay anyway apparently, we just put in a pvc liner with no sand or geotextile under it. It took a little bit of discussion and finessing but eventually we got it where we wanted.

And now for the water…

We are fortunate enough to have a rainwater reservoir installed, so all the rainfall from the roof was stored, perfect for our pond purposes as it should be clean but low in nutrients. On went the pump and a couple of hours later, there is our pond:

At this point I feel I should admit that we have “introduced” some wildlife, two pond skaters and a few bits of duck weed were safely captured and carried home in a plastic jar to our pond from the nearby Søndermarken park. We’ve also planted a few water lilies on the bottom.
Now, let’s see what else can come visiting….