Design

With a virgin piece of ground in which to dig a giant pond and being able to be there on site right from the start, I knew we could get it right. But life, the world, Sod's law and everything just dont let thingsThe site was levelled before the pond excavation proper started. happen too smoothly.

CONSTRUCTION TECHNIQUES FOR EDGING THE POOL - A quick-fire guide

Materials – Capping or coping stones, sand, cement, waterproofing powder or liquid, silglaze. If a good firm bonding is essential then use SBR Bonding solution. This will allow you to dispense with the waterproofer, but is quite expensive.
Tools. Shovel, round ended trowel, level, lump hammer and stiff brush.

Think about it. Turn not the first sod, until you have mentally pictured the whole project right through to ‘pointing’ your last slab.
There seems to be many people that think creating a pool, even a water garden, is just about digging holes. As a landscaper I often found myself being asked to view the site of a potential water garden with the assurance: “We’ve done most of the work, we’ve dug the hole”.
Then I’d arrive at the site to be presented with a site not unlike a film set facsimile of a scene from a 1st World War battle of the Somme and an enormous bomb crater. This would only serve to confirm that the process just had not been worked out at all. I would return home, sketch out a plan and spend the best part of 4 hours, working out a detailed price, whilst seeing the costs of the excavation pale into insignificance against the equally onerous expenses of lining, power supply for pumps and for would-be koi keepers, and filter systems themselves…….
And then there was the edging....

RAISED POOLS OR WATER GARDENS: what's so special about raised pools?

In the process of building a raised pool you are creating an instant focal point in an otherwise dull flat, usually formal area. Not only that it also has potential for a seating area or incorporated into raised beds.A dull site.
Children and wheel chairs are less inclined to wander into it and the infirm and disabled have a better view of the contents. Built to the correct height and if it is accessible from all sides, the wheelchair user has no problems maintaining it for themselves throughout the year.
For many Koi carp enthusiasts, the added expense of building up and out of the ground is more than compensated by the ease of maintenance particularly when it comes to maintaining the obligatory filter system

SIMPLE RAISED POOL USING A PREFORMED SHAPE: The Method

Essential tools: Spade, shovel, level, trowel, pegs, lump hammer.
Materials: Sand, cement, 15-20mm chippings (to dust), stone or brick. For capping the edge you might want to use special capping stones, engineering brick, slabs, crazy paving - good for awkward shapes giving a rustic look - or even wood to soften otherwise hard stony formal landscaping.

Site cleared, pool tried in position.1.For a preformed fibreglass or plastic pool - choose your pool shape. A formal shape looks best close to the house, either angular to fit in with the patio shape or round for a wishingFootings in place for the blockwork and, in this case, a small patio. well effect. If it is only partially raised with part set into a bank then any simple shape will do.

2.Place the pool 'in situ'. Level the site beneath where the pool is placed and have it sitting roughly at the level you would wish it to be.

FOOTINGS OR FOUNDATIONS FOR PREFORMED POOLS

3. For the preformed pool option - using a plumb line or a vertical spirit level, mark out the edge of the pool on the ground. Use this as a guide to dig a trench 10cmm/4ins deep for footings all the way round the pool. Take the trench under the pool the same width as the pool rim. It should be as wide as the top of the pool is designed to be. If the top of the pool is going to double as a bench for seating then it needs to be 300mm/1ft wide minimum.

Water features raised out of the ground need extra consideration when it comes to strength of infra-structure, but basically the rules to getting it right are pretty much the same as any water garden. These will follow in subsequent articles.

It occurred to us that if you were following the step by step guides to putting in your own pond, if you were building one that was out of the ground then you might think there was one or two gaps in the step-by-steps as far as putting in raised ponds. The differences are hidden and start at the very beginning and this needs to be addressed.

SEEKING INSPIRATION

If you are new to the step-by-steps and still at the 'seeking inspiration stage' you might ask why you might want to consider a raised pool for a water garden. Here are a number of very good reasons below.

Advantages of raised ponds and water feaures:

There is very little digging involved. For gardens with a high bedrock or high water table this is essential. Sloping gardens often have this problem where it is often quite possible to dig in the water garden to a certain extent, but it may be practical to have part of the pool raised out of the ground. If the ground slopes away from the house, it makes the water surface more visible from the house. To dig means excess spoil, great mounds of earth that have to be disposed of.

Formal gardens lend themselves to raised water features. Patios and parterrres need a focal point and a dramatic water feature performs the perfect role. Being raised it can also function as a cool or interesting place to sit. Being raised they make an architectural statement to the garden design,reflecting the style or period of the garden or house design.

Raised pools are safer for children and invalid people. Also they are more accessible and the surface is easier to see. Koi keepers like raised pool for this reason. Also the mechanics of filtration etc can be more easily be hidden away behind.

Disadvatages:

Labour intensive if stonework is involved. But always more expensive.

Any raised walls need to have a good footing or foundation that is the depth equivalent of one quarter to one third of the height of the wall. They should also extend two or three times the width of the wall. If you build a concrete block skeleton then this extra width serves to provide a footing for the facing stone inside and out. If the feature is large then building skill and practices must be employed for safety's sake as one young couple, who had the contents of a pond arrive through their dining room French windows, will testify, and in fact did testify in court.

Originally printed in the Water Gardener Magazine December 2002

Next time you get an electricity bill and it is a warm sunny day, take it outside and stand next to your pond. Feel the heat of the sun and enjoy it. Doesn’t it seem a shame to have to pay for the running of all the conveniences of life like heating and cooling and machines when there is that great power station in the sky pumping out all that energy for free?
Look down into the pool and (possibly) see the green gloom of the algae proliferating down in that water. If you have a biological filter system with u/v clarifiers, then look at that. Then say to yourself,
“Hey! I’m a complete IDIOT. Here are millions of the simplest plants on earth multiplying and growing and even moving, largely by the power of the sun, and I here am I spending money on electricity to destroy them, the production of which pollutes the planet!”

Is it time to seriously consider renewable power supplies for our water gardens? Does the technology not come up to scratch? If it does, is it too expensive to be worth considering?
These are questions we hope to be answering this week.

Sustainable resources, ‘green power’, renewable energy and carbon footprints are terms that persistently intrude on our daily lives. With the ever increasing worry about our energy consumption leading to increases in the levels of ‘greenhouse gases’ and therefore the threat of global warming, is the use of electrical power to pump filter water in our fish ponds just total decadence and pointless squandering of electrical power? The Marshall's Sustainability Garden at the Chelsea Flower Show gave a good example of how we might deal with it, so are Solar Power with Photovoltaic panels the answer in our dull country?

Oase leads the way in Solar pump and panel marketIn response to a growing concern, manufacturers of submersible pumps have tried more and more to make their pumps more energy efficient. But perhaps this is not enough, since these pumps areThe Solar panels in the Marshall's Sustainability Garden at the Chelsea Flower Show 2007 likely to be running none stop 24/7, and a continuous use of a small amount of electricity (like with the stand by lights on home electrical items) adds up to being the main drain on our domestic power consumption.

Meanwhile the manufacturers of Solar Power driven products have been keenly trying to tap into an ever-increasing demand for products driven by the sun. Unfortunately some of these manufacturers have been their own worst enemy in providing products to meet the demand, because basically the products don’t work.

Lights that barely light and pumps that hardly pump and solar panels that just fade away in just a short time do not endear the concept of Solar Power to the general public. So many people have been tempted by the prospect of some useful bit of lighting (cheap with six gallons of petrol from their petrol station) and been disappointed by pathetic glows that could be generated more effectively by luminous paint or glow-worms. As for solar powered submersible pumps, I have come across innumerable aquatic storekeepers that have actively discouraged people from considering solar power pumps and fountains.

The truth is that although the demand for solar power is increasing exponentially, even in the dull and cloudy UK, the technological magic of producing power from the sun has not got proportionately more sophisticated. HoweverA floating fountain with a remote panel is more effective than one that is integral. the technology is there to produce useable power for the home and gardener, it just aint cheap. Or at least I should say, it does not seem cheap.

If you were to take all your prospective electrical fuel bills at the current rates for the next ten years, you might find that you were paying a bit over the odds by having PROPER PROFESSIONAL STANDARD Solar panels installed. But if you were to factor in the probable increase in fuel costs in that time and that the power generation from your home will continue, you will then start to see you are on the winning side. If you have chosen to link into the National Grid you may even be earning money from the power you generate. If you have chosen to store your power, bear in mind the possible cost replacement storage batteries in that time, but in the long run this is no great expense.

On top of that you can rest assured that you ‘carbon-footprint’ is pretty small and that you positively doing something FOR the planet rather than doing LESS to damage it.
This week I am reprinting an article I wrote back in 2002 when I visited Anthony Skelton one of the first people in the country to make his house (his parent’s house actually) completely self-sufficient in electricity and even to generate more than enough power so that the excess actually was fed back into the National Grid and paid for by his electricity board. Anthony cut through reams of red tape to make his parent’s house the smallest power station in the country, a private bungalow in the heart of Warwickshire.

Although we have started a series of articles guiding you through the basics of building a pond, we thought that we would start the new year by going back to basics just so that the there are a few practical considerations well and truly catered for before we actually get much further.
For those of you considering building your first pond, or for those of you who have built your first pond and it looks as though you may have to start again, here is very early article written by Peter May that aims to introduce the novice to some of the most important ingredients to consider when creating a perfect water garden.

WHATEVER THE PROBLEM, HERE IS THE SOLUTION - THE PERFECT POND RECIPE

Spirogyra or blanket weed has completely taken over Does your pond look like the grave of a Swamp Thing? Or does the water look like it contains the swill from some riotous goblin party with green slimey candy floss and vile unctuous jelly? IfLilies Water Gardens;A Time to Reflect;Hampton Court 2006- An ideal to strive for. so, it might be because some essential ingredient is missing, or there might be too much of some and not enough of another.
Perhaps you haven't even attempted a water garden yet, but it had crossed your mind because you know it would make the perfect focal point in your garden. You haven't attempted it yet because you thought you might make a mess of it.

Christmas is coming and the koi are getting fat! (hopefully, so they are fit for the winter slow-down). Along with the hopes for the forthcoming winter there is not much to do around the water garden. All the plants are cut back and the pond netted, so unless you are planning a brand new project you can relax to a certain extent, but it is the that time of year when every day brings a reminder that an expedition of Christmas shopping is looming ever closer on the time horizon; tinsel in the shops, festive events being arranged and gaudy catalogues dropping out of magazines. It can all get a bit daunting especially when it all seems to start so early. The temptation with having modern technology is to sneek a look on the computer and see what might be available from the web without having to step foot outside the door into the throbbing melee of irascible Christmas Shoppers. So what might be out there that might amuse, titivate or be genuinely useful to the water gardener in your life, especially taking the time of year into account?

Its like chickens and eggs with outdoor ponds and pools; every person that keeps fish will at sometime keep fish in a pond or pool outdoors. If he or she doesn’t then I bet they wished they could. Now I’ve come across some pretty dedicated fish keepers in my time, particularly when I was doing a talk tour of South Africa.

Here I met people for whom fish was the pole star around which their whole universe revolved.