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In this video i show you how i turned a water pit into an all natural pond without pond liner. This pond requires very low maintenance but some local conditions have to be met for it to function. Thank you for watching, feel free to subscribe or comment if you have questions.
hi there, I'm Carl the landscape guy and today I want to show you how I converted this back yard water pit into a 3000 square foot all natural pond. Now in a pond you want to try to keep the water level as constant as possible. The water level in this pit was fluctuating by about 2 to 3 feet depending on the weather. Rainwater would fill it up, especially during the winter months and during a hot summer there wasn't much water left in there. This situation was really unsightly especially since the main line of sight in this back yard is right on the water pit. In order to minimize the water level fluctuation, I started by connecting the pit to the closest rain water ditch. For that i used about 250 feet of pvc drainage piping, 6 inches in diameter. The pipes were installed on a slope that way the water from the ditch would flow into the pit. I chose only a small slope for the piping so that if the pond is filled up, water can flow backwards into the ditch not overflowing the pond. In addition to that, I connected the rain gutters of the house to the pipe to use existing water as efficient as possible. After these preliminary works I started cutting off all the grass, bushes and little trees about 15 feet around the edges of the pit. Now I could start re-modeling the new pond edges. Since no pond liner is used and all water in the pond will be rain or ground water there will still be small water level fluctuations. That's why I took away the sloping terrain and created a steeper edge. With this relatively steep edge even if the water level fluctuates the water surface will stay about the same. With this 2 ton excavator it took me one day to finish the pond edges. The pond has a depth of about 6 feet. An all natural non liner pond only works on sites with fine soil like clay or loam which has a low co-efficiency of permeability or it also works if you have a high ground water level. Natural wells or brooks around a backyard make a perfect supply for natural ponds. Now it's time to flatten the soil around the pond and plant the first water plants. If you don't want to spend money on water plants you can go to local lakes or rivers to get regional plants you like. If you do so don't destroy natural wildlife habitat. Take only small plant offshoots, they will spread in their new habitat. If you want to put fish in your natural pond that's ok but wait until plants have grown and don't put too many fish in. Since it's a natural pond I didn't add any pumps and filters and I put in about 10 fish. If you feed the fish keep in mind that all nutrients put into the water will have to be clarified by the pond itself. If you add too many nutrients, algae will grow and the fish might suffer. I decided to add a few Stones and one bigger tree stump from the woods with moss on it. This use of regional materials helps to create an all natural character of the pond and improves its appearance. It helps to add only one or two eye catchers, otherwise your eye doesn't know where to look and it doesn't have the effect of creating a harmonic atmosphere . With this pond we look at a low maintenance level. Each fall I cut the grass and plants around the edges and that's about it. I hope this video was informative and helpful for you. If so I would appreciate a "thumbs up". Feel free to subscribe for more videos on ponds, brooks, waterfalls and other garden stuff. Thanks for watching, I'm Carl the landscape guy, good luck with your project and see you next time.
