Yet Another Cycling Forum
Random Musings => Miscellany => Where The Wild Things Are => Topic started by: Mrs Pingu on 19 December, 2021, 06:51:52 pm
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One day we'd like to build a wildlife pond. Now that we've been at Pingu Towers mkIII for a couple of months we now know that the soil tends to clay and we have been able to observe where the puddles build up when it rains (marked as 'boggy' on the photo).
Originally I'd been thinking about the left hand side of the garden but now seeing where the water builds up we were thinking the RHS might be a more sensible place for the pond.
The garden is on a slight slope towards the house.
(https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/51757075361_825034944f.jpg) (https://flic.kr/p/2mRAxji)2021-12-19_06-41-55 (https://flic.kr/p/2mRAxji) by The Pingus (https://www.flickr.com/photos/the_pingus/), on Flickr
However, I'm aware that you don't want soil and nutrients getting in a wildlife pond so I'm concerned about the potential of run off down the garden and into the pond.
I'm sure some of you clever peeps have some experience... thoughts?
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I’m far from an expert, but my 2p...
My (very small) wildlife* pond is a sunken plant container. It sits just a bit above the soil, with ramps either side to avoid trapping anything. That avoids soil getting in, though the plants around it still shed their leaves at it - but also provide some shelter around it.
Will you end up needing to mow around it? Will that sabotage attempts to keep the water fresh, or interact badly with an electric mower?
* there’s some plants, water and no deliberate fish. It’s attracted a frog, and is more reliably full than our bird bath. Does it qualify as a wildlife pond?
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Pingu actually already put a pond in, it's a washing up bowl sunk into the LHS bed :)
Given our old downstairs neighbour's pond was surrounded by grass I would think mowing should be ok if we're careful (and place enough plants round the edge).
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I don't think I've got room for a pond but I'd like one. My brother has quite a big garden and he dug one by hand, and it's at least 20 inches deep and probably about 10 square metres. He uses it to breed frogs and quite often has to remove grass snakes and take them for a walk to another pond about half a mile away.
Last winter he tried to walk on the ice, with hilarious consequences.
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We used to have a pond about 3m in diameter and 60cm in depth. Fish and all until one winter it got down to -22°C and then it was just lillies, frogs and mozzies in season. Then one of our Leonbergs got a bit too fond of bringing us complete lily plants and copious helpings of pond mud to tease out of his fur so we dumped the liner and turned it into a dell. Life without mosquitoes was wonderful.
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Looks like we need to find YAPF...
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We installed a pond when we moved to CET Towers in 1996. It's 3m x 1.5m x 60cm deep, which was a very big hole, and took some to dig, although we were lucky to be a back corner plot where they'd heaped up all the top soil. Around the edge we put a layer of stone chippings, so most of the soil drainage goes into that rather than the pond. To oxygenate it we have a pump which feeds a waterfall, with about a 45cm drop (that's where much of the soil went, to be the base for a rockery). It has a custom stainless steel grid over the top, which cost a fortune, but replaces the plastic mesh which was there to keep herons, cats, hedgehogs, and children out.
Every year I pull out 90% of the floating oxygenating weed, and cut back the water mint all the way to its underwater pot. There are also irises and a huge marsh marigold which we planted in 1997 and still survive. There are goldfish in there, which we don't feed and are a self-sustaining population. There are always frogs. I've seen toads in the garden and I sometimes find newts when I'm cleaning out the pond, including a great crested newt one year.
The key things are: 1) having a pond big enough, so that it can be self-sustaining, 2) the water flow, to keep it oxygenated, which also seems to help avoid mosquitos, 3) the annual clean, so that it doesn't revert to bog.
I would expect its probably only about 45cm deep now, with the rest being a steady accumulation of mud, but that's not a worry, it just encourages more stuff to live in it.
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Lots of pond advice here:
https://freshwaterhabitats.org.uk/pond-clinic/create-pond/ (https://freshwaterhabitats.org.uk/pond-clinic/create-pond/)
For a more caledonian twist :-X
https://www.sepa.org.uk/media/151336/ponds_pools_lochans.pdf (https://www.sepa.org.uk/media/151336/ponds_pools_lochans.pdf)
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Yes I've already read the first one (and several others similar) and don't think the SEPA one is really aimed at your average back garden puddle. Just struggling to find much useful info on slopes. I think we're just going to end up digging it and suck it and see.
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Our pond started off over 5ft deep at the deepest.
The shallow end is rapidly progressing to sphagnum bog, while the deeper end is a flourishing fen carr.
Been heaving willow seedlings out of it today.
But it does support a lot of wildlife.
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It looks like I've scored some free pond building material from a local wildlife Facebook group :thumbsup:
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Pond had its annual clean out last weekend, took out about a kilo of mud from the filter, so the waterfall is running a lot better now. Also heaved out surplus oxygenating weed and shrank the water mint back to 5% of pond cover from the 30% it gets to each year. There are 5 goldfish, descendants of the ones that were put in there in 1997 and there was a dead newt stuck to the pump water filter. Less frogspawn than usual.
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Looks like we need to find YAPF...
Feline (OTP) runs this one https://www.koiforum.uk/
Sent from my motorola edge 20 using Tapatalk
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A fish pond isn't a wildlife pond. No need for pumps and filters etc in a wildlife pond. They are more likely just to disturb the wildlife.
Plenty of oxygenating plants will keep it fresh enough. Though its natural for it to go a bit green from time to time, especially as its getting established. Adding some daphnia may help to control algae, and provide food for wildlife.
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Don't dig it here, dig it over there.
(https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/52012587343_d4166eb326_z.jpg) (https://flic.kr/p/2nfb78i)
IMG_9757_01 (https://flic.kr/p/2nfb78i) by The Pingus (https://www.flickr.com/photos/the_pingus/), on Flickr
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Aberdonians never got the hang of peat cutting.
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I have cleaned the camera lens now...
Also, I was a bit shocked when I got back to the office after a long lunch, had a quick shufti at my phone and saw the big hole in our lawn :o
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Inspector of works.
(https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/52013567205_eb22e4cbe6_z.jpg) (https://flic.kr/p/2nfg8pt)
IMG_9760 (https://flic.kr/p/2nfg8pt) by The Pingus (https://www.flickr.com/photos/the_pingus/), on Flickr
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Inspecting the new litter tray?
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This was the pond the next day. We then decided we might have been slightly hasty trimming the liner as we'd not really decided how to keep it in place.
(https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/52040144233_c9a33215b7.jpg) (https://flic.kr/p/2nhBkQ6)2022-04-30_04-22-50 (https://flic.kr/p/2nhBkQ6) by The Pingus (https://www.flickr.com/photos/the_pingus/), on Flickr
Anyway, today Pingu seemed set to empty it and put a new bit of liner in, but then we found someone had moved in already.
(https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/52040229270_e9ef96712b.jpg) (https://flic.kr/p/2nhBM7f)IMG_9944_01 (https://flic.kr/p/2nhBM7f) by The Pingus (https://www.flickr.com/photos/the_pingus/), on Flickr
So we took the lazy gits way out and back filled the turf a bit.
(https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/52040469870_785f44578d.jpg) (https://flic.kr/p/2nhD1Cw)IMG_20220430_143512 (https://flic.kr/p/2nhD1Cw) by The Pingus (https://www.flickr.com/photos/the_pingus/), on Flickr
(https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/52040469790_4df9acbac9.jpg) (https://flic.kr/p/2nhD1B9)IMG_20220430_143531 (https://flic.kr/p/2nhD1B9) by The Pingus (https://www.flickr.com/photos/the_pingus/), on Flickr
Needs plants now...
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Pond update:
We were utterly failing to choose plants, so we went for Waterside's starter pack for a 1-2m2 pond.
(https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/52085695650_8db3056a2d.jpg) (https://flic.kr/p/2nmCNFm)2022-05-19_09-50-23 (https://flic.kr/p/2nmCNFm) by The Pingus (https://www.flickr.com/photos/the_pingus/), on Flickr
Seems to me like we still need more plants, I don't think that's enough?
On the plus side they were kind enough to send some wildlife, I think the 1st one might be some sort of odonata nymph (there were a couple but one was dead).
(https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/52085199811_de44b923a8.jpg) (https://flic.kr/p/2nmAghp)2022-05-19_09-51-31 (https://flic.kr/p/2nmAghp) by The Pingus (https://www.flickr.com/photos/the_pingus/), on Flickr
(https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/52084165107_11d8a6fde6.jpg) (https://flic.kr/p/2nmuXGF)2022-05-19_09-50-42 (https://flic.kr/p/2nmuXGF) by The Pingus (https://www.flickr.com/photos/the_pingus/), on Flickr
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Once we've got the storm damage cleared (that'll only take 7 years, at the rate we're going), I'll be putting a pond in at the Ravenbait Eyrie. One of the first things I'll do is snaffle some duckweed from somewhere. We put in a large pond in the garden in Devon, and it was an algae-filled nightmare until some duckweed got in there and the lilies grew. Then it magically cleared and became a really good wildlife pond with lots of frogs, toads, breeding dragonflies, the lot.
Sam
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I have a feeling we just hoicked some duckweed out of the washing up bowl pond...
It looked like globs of jelly in the water but was green and weedy when we pulled it out.
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Duckweed forms wee round leaves like teeny tiny lily pads that float on the surface.
(https://www.fishtankreport.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/Common-Duckweed-Duckweed-Lesser-Duckweed.jpg)
Sam
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Ah, thanks. Not what we had then.
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Finally got over the too much choice analysis paralysis and ordered some more plants today. Pingu picked up some yellow flag irises off someone OTP last weekend too so hopefully it'll be looking a bit more pond like soon.
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Well, it looks like a big hole with some more plants in it now.
(https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/52112858396_0bf8351a8f.jpg) (https://flic.kr/p/2np32dy)2022-05-31_07-04-24 (https://flic.kr/p/2np32dy) by The Pingus (https://www.flickr.com/photos/the_pingus/), on Flickr
I need to find some more stones.
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First damselfly visitor today :thumbsup:
(https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/52165811320_2cceba85e9_z.jpg) (https://flic.kr/p/2ntHqh1)
IMG_1475_01 (https://flic.kr/p/2ntHqh1) by The Pingus (https://www.flickr.com/photos/the_pingus/), on Flickr
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Today there were Dragonflies in tandem mating and laying their eggs in the pond :thumbsup:
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We need more plants. Think the lily might have died (there were no more pads by the end of the summer) so we might need to buy a new one of those. Need more other stuff too to pad it out a bit and cover the surface up. Trying to keep to stuff that is native makes it a bit harder though.
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Don't be tempted by native bogbean.
I will certainly give surface cover, it is beautiful in flower and the bees love it, but it will take over not just the pond, but the entire garden.
Same for pendulous sedge....
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If you are in the frozen north, I would expect most plants to die back over winter, even the ones described as hardy.
I have got some bogbean in my pond, it seems to be one of the only things still around at this time of year. Though maybe best in a larger pond.
I also like frogbit. It is a kind of mini water lily, good for surface cover. Over winter the buds sink to the bottom of the pond. But it should return and spread as gets warmer.
Marsh marigold and water mint seem quite tough as well.