Landscape ponds water gardening information

Landscape ponds the right way.

Pegging is the procedure to follow to landscape ponds on uneven ground.

For fish ponds or garden ponds on uneven ground, peg the pond out before you make the final decision about where and how big it will be.

Tools required to landscape ponds on uneven ground:

• 3footstraight edge. This could be a good piece of timber (perhaps 2inches by 1inch) that has an un-curved, unwavering edge to it as you look along the edge from one end to the other.

• A very heavy hammer.

• As long a spirit level as you can find. A 'Dumpy' builders level can be hired from a tool hire merchant. These need two people to operate them, but they help you find levels very accurately and are indispensable for a large landscape ponds project. Levels that shoot out a laser spot to a level some yards away are a useful new invention for the ponds landscaper and pond constructor.

• Several stout pegs., some longer than the depth of the pool, others just longer than the depth of the marginal shelf.

This photograph of a landscaped ponds pegged out hole shows the excavation including the marginal shelf

Take several strong 5cm (2ins) square pegs and mark them ready to pinpont the landscaped ponds area.

To mark out the perimeter of the landscaped ponds area the pegs may not need to be more than 30cm long since they are just going down to the marginal shelf level. But if the ground drops a way sharply then those marking the low edge will need to be a few centimetres deeper than the proposed depth of the pool (between 60cm and 1mtr - 2ft to roughly 3ft).

Mark the short pegs with an indelible line at 23cm (9ins). This mark will be an indicator to you when you have dug down to the marginal shelf level. Mark the long pegs with an indelible line near the bottom of the peg that will indicate the final depth of your excavation (adding 5cm for a layer of sand to the mean landscaped pond's depth that will cushion the liner) e.g. for a pool 60cm deep(2ft) add 5cm (2ins), the total depth excavated 65cm (26ins). If you are keen enough to contemplate a concrete lined pool add on an extra 15cm in every direction.

If the pool is going to be created some way from the house, paint the tops of the pegs with something to make them easily visible so that you can see the landscaped pond's shape from the house.

Choose one of the long pegs as a datum peg for the pool water level and drive it into what you consider to be the centre of the landscaped ponds surface area to roughly the water level you foresee.

The top of this peg will mark the level to which you drive in all the other pegs. Keep them less than 2.5 metres (8 ft) apart. Save the longer ones for gauging the depth of the excavation later if you can. Mark the perimeter with shorter ones, but in steeply sloping situations you may need the long ones to mark the landscaped ponds perimeter on the low side.

Keep all the pegs roughly 15cm (6ins) inside the line of your proposed landscaped ponds perimeter. If there is turf roughly undulating around the site it may be necessary to remove some of it in the landscaped ponds area to get a clearer view of the lie of the land .... maybe even a few inches of soil.

Landscaped ponds - why so much trouble?

I expect you are beginning to wonder why you just don't launch into it straight off , having dedicated so much effort so far. Well at this stage at least you haven't dedicated any hard earned cash nor made a decision you cannot reverse. Having got this far, now you can sit back,look, consider and firmly decide upon any possible changes.

You can gauge the size precisely and the amount of engineering involved and the amount of expense effort and hard landscaping required to complete the landscaping of the pond.

Take a look at my Perfect Pond Recipe book .... available by download or print

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