my damaged pond

Try to be optimistic San. I know it's not easy but it will come good. You are too strong to let it beat you down.

Before you know it, it will be up and running and looking just the way you imagined or better. :0))

thankyou Dan, was a bit of a shock to find it full again :o(

Sanbaz I thought of you when I heard the thunder and lightening here in london. Wishing you well

Everything will come right, as old Paul Kruger (circa 1900) used to say.

omg...thats aweful Sandra...hope u get it sorted soon...

I suppose it must be the water table in your area, Sanbaz. I know if I dig in my front garden I hit water almost immediately at the moment. That's one of the problems with heavy clay :(

Hi Sandra... better weather will make it easier for you to feel more optimistic about the pond project.. Eventually it will look lovely. xxx

thankyou great, Gb, sandra, Gee. and Terra, x
Gee once gone and ive redone will this water table thing make it happen again, will it come up from beneath all the time do you think or is this because its a bare hole, im worried.
Terra im praying for good weather and im sure your right ;o) xx

How awful Sandra, do hope it drains away quickly and you are able to get it sorted, problem is the weather forecast isnt too good for tonight and Friday, just try to focus on something else and hopefully the rain will stop and the sun will shine again ;0)

thanx carole, weather not good is it but been so sunny here today, oh well patients is a virtue lol :o))

Sandra... I guess at least while the pond is full of water, it means the rest of your garden isn't waterlogged ? All the excess running towards to pond ?

one way to look at it Terra, if it does this now wont it always do it under pond liner or is it because nothing in it at moment

Not easy to say about the flooding without visiting your garden, but it seems to me you might do well to put in some kind of extra drainage channel/pipe running away from under/near the pond to remove excess water....

I'm not sure what the answer is, Sanbaz, but it might be an idea to contact someone like World of Water and ask their advice about water table levels and how to deal with it. Some websites say you don't need a liner as the clay will hold the water but that it can dry out in periods of drought! Not very helpful. I am thinking like you, if the pond is full of water then the weight should prevent the liner coming up again. I wonder if there are any engineering/landscape GoYers who can answer that question simply? I'm sure it can be sorted but it's how best to go about it without wearing yourselves out.

thanx Terra and Gee, i though you could have a pond in any soil and maybe your right once new liner in and weight it probably will be ok

Is your pond lower than the surrounding Garden Sanbaz? If it is it will tend to fill as it drains from the garden with a small pond this is not good because it will over flow at times.
But if you think about it the new water cannot drain away as you said there were no holes in the liner. So you need to make a couple of small holes in it to let the water escape, then when its dry and not likely to rain heavily, clean it out and put a new liner over the old one.

the liner is out Drc, i emptied it and covered so if it rained would be ok, but today the hole was full again, no rain today so cant understand this, we have clay so think this is from area around pond, its about level with grass area next to pond

Sandra hang in there im sure im good time with good weather all will be sorted out

There has been a great deal of rain Sanbaz we have a lot of flooding in the fields. If the liner is out it will drain but on clay it is slower, mine is on clay. Wait till the weather changes it will drain and then you will have mud with stones in the bottom and with out the liner you may find it more difficult to clean out again. But chin up I got so fed up with mine when I started but it comes right in the end and you will get so much pleasure by the summer. I really would wait till the better weather, so you dont damage the edges.

ok thanx for the addvice Drc, i appreciate it, i will hang on and hope for better weather ;o)

oops sorry i missed you Rkalyan, thanyou :o))

How awful Sandra, I don`t know anything about ponds and would have thought you could put one anywhere in any soil. I`m sure you`ll get the right advice and everything will come good in the end. xx

:-( . .........but if the surrounding land is going to drain to this area, best to know now before it got established. (That's me trying to be positive!).
TT could be right, about putting in drainage..... :-)

Potty is right Sandra best you know now.......Lol

thanx sandra, potty and maureen, baz says its because its clay and will be ok once ground has drained, then once bigger liner in the weight will stop water coming up, its because its open, i hope so

Oh poor you it so upsetting after all your hard work

What a dissheartening thing to happen. Did the rain turn the soil into mud then sliver down into your pond Sanbaz? Don't feel down about it. Perhaps where the pond is set lower than the soil you will have to raise up up to the soil level then place some roacks around higher than the soil. From the photo it looks like the pond is set lower. Don't know if this helps.

I asked my husband as for your case, Sandra. He says you should make your pond upper, deeper and bigger to contain all the water. Anyway, am sure everything will be ok! xxxx

once you have raised the pond level to the soil level you can always make a shallow end for the wildlife. If you leave it as it is it may well flood with mud again the next time we have torrential rain.

thanx neelan, linda and uma. i think i know what you mean, where the higer shelf is , make that wider and then my overlap should be alot wider on ground level, is that right

it will soon sort itself out when it stops raining.... then you can make your pond again..... all will be well in the end...and just think how lovely it will look in the summer with all your new plants round it.......

thanx holly, im sure if i do a bigger overlap and shelf it will be better cause the rain wont soak into ground so close to pond edge :o))

yes that sounds a good idea....

fingers crossed hey! no chance yet till better weather lol

The weather usually gets better after the easter hols.. when everyones gone back to work...lol

about right holly haha :o)

: O ))

Sandra look well if you could have had a natural pond, on my friends allotment they dug a great big hole for a pond, and the next day it was 1/2 full of water so they left it, never put a liner or anything in it and the pond is there all the time, the water does go low in summer but first bit of rain and its full again, the alotments are at oxford square, do you know where i mean, and its not all that far from me or staining if you do bird miles. plus there is ducks on it quite alot of the time. x

Oh dear, keep your chin up San, it will come right.

yes i know where you mean carol, alot on here have clay but still have a ,liner in pond so im hoping with a larger overlap it will be ok, but waiting for dry weather then scoop out last of water and start again, ive bought new liner so cant waste the money ive spent, baz will go mad, also dont want it muddy, i know you can have a natural clay pond ive read up on them and a customer`s son has one, not for me though :o))
thanx yorkshire lets hope so or baz will divorce me lol

so sorry..but think positive

thanx deida i will :o)

San...the basic foudations are there so amm sure all the advice about waiting for better weather is right.Youre like me...impatient to see the end result.Poor Ray had a deadline of my birthday to meet to fill our pond.You should have seen him go ! Lol

lol jane, do you think once we have a bigger overlap it will be ok, im worried incase it happens again with being clay on bottom, i hope it is ok after ive spent alot of money on good liner and a pump/filter, baz isnt to happy but he will get over it ahahah

Yes San Ray says to tell you that once the good liner is in place with decent overlap you shouldnt have any more problems.He does advise you to lay the whole of the old liner in the bottom of the pond..then cover that with a couple of bags of builders or play sand (not sharp sand..that contains grit ).If he can then cover the sides of the pond with a layer of sand too (with a trowel ) THEN put your good liner in place. All this will prevent seepages from waterlogged soil surrounding your pond. Sounds complicated but this is what Ray did..and we have never had any problems.Hope Baz can make sense of this.

thanx jane, yes i understand but how does the sand stick to sides, maybe it does and im being a women lol,, baz said he will dig a bit deeper to allow for old liner and sand so we dont lose depth, the pond man worked out size of liner so we should get a good overlap and plenty to do waterfall without adding a piece, will be all in one, just have to wait for it to dry out now so we can try again :o)) tell ray thanx alot for addvice x

Okay San...Baz has the right idea...the sand will be damp so will stick to the sides...it is a woman thing....I wondered that too !! Lol x

lol jane cheers ;o)) x

All will be well xxx : o )

Hi Sandra could you dig a few test holes in a few places in the garden about the the length and breadth of your shovel and dig down and see where the water table is this would give you a better idea what to do with your pond :-)

thanx richard the place we put it in is the only place for it to go and the only place it doesnt flood like some of the garden, but baz will take a look and see what happens :o))

Hi Sandra, sorry to read of your trauma, I've not been around for a few days as we are doing pond work too. These water levels I find very complicated but water will always find the lowest point. We have an overflow exit for the water when our level rises.

thanx dawn do you mean from the pond? our water went under overlap because we didnt allow enough im sure about that now as ive spoken to pond man at garden centre, so a much bigger liner will be going in, also im raising the surrounding ground level so pond isnt lower than area, hopefully this will work, if not ive wasted alot of money on pond liner and will get a pond tub,:o(

Yes Sandra, we have a channel from the pond for excess water to escape. Sorry, I didnt realise the water went under the overlap. I'm no expert Sandra but I think raising the surrounding area will only work if its totally water tight, if you know what I mean. Poor you, these ponds arent straight forward are they.

the man said if i have a good overlap then when it rains its far enough away not to go under liner, hopfully it will just go down into ground, i do hope so dawn, i couldnt stand another episode of this :o( there are alot of member with small ponds like mine who had trouble at first but ok now so fingers crossed

Good luck Sandra, I hope it works for you too.

Hi again Sanbaz, I agree a wide area round the pond for the lining to lay over is required mine is 22" all the way around the pond and it is flat. But no one has mentioned you need to weight this liner down so to stop it lifting I have round paving holding my liner in place with small pebbles in the spaces. Firstly though when the liner is in place and filled with water, leave it a few days to settle into the pockets/creases before anchoring it down as it can settle quite a bit sometimes and this may shorten the sides? After a few days you can then trim any excess off, and cover it with your choice.

hi Drc, thanx for the advice will do what you said, so do we not place any rocks around to keep liner in place or just odd ones so wind doesnt blow it ? good idea with round paving on bottom so it doesnt raise up ;o)

Hi Sandra, I think you have the same issues as me! i haven't started a pond, mainly because we are on clay and there are a lot of boggy areas in the garden when it's wet. I'm worried that if I dig out a hole I will create a big sump and all the water from the rest of the garden will come in to it. It looks like that is what has happened to your hole here... I dug out a circular border a couple of years ago and it just became a bog! I filled it in again, but it is still very very boggy when it rains. As someone else has said, perhaps a more raised area of the garden would be preferable? The problem with that is it doesn't look natural because a pond would naturally occur on lower ground! Still, if it works..... I'm no expert but this doesn't look promising to me.......sorry if that's a bit negative, but I'd hate for you to have the same problem all over again......eek! I fear you may be fighting a losing battle here.....sorry x :))

When I filled my pond Sanbaz I left the liner sticking up for a few days till it had really settled then laid it down and anchored it, I did have quite a bit to trim
so this worked well for me. Not sure about your last sentence? I did mean my paving is all round the pond edges on top of the liner edges? I think it will be ok when its dry enough to do, mine is on clay and I have never regretted it.

Well, go for it San, I'm sure if it is ok for Drc it will be ok for you too! Other option I guess is just to leave it as a natural pond for a while and see if it lasts!? ;)

Drc i thought you ment weigh it down in water on liner at botton, you mean around edges which i did and will do thanx,ours is clay about 12" down so sides arent as clay, botton is very clay, ;o)
karen this part doesnt normally flood like other areas so im going to give it another shot, and make sure i give a good overlap, many on here like Drc have clay and still have ponds,if all else fails we will get one of then black ridged ponds, like a big bowl about 2' deep that way nothing will bring it up lol, hope not to have to do this as its cost alot for new rubber liner, the best one pond man said :o))

Good luck with what ever you decide to do Sandra I am sure that you and Baz will conquer in the end !!! and come up with a beautiful pond for us all to see we are waiting for your pics!!. :-)

aww thanx richard im sure all will be ok after all our advice and help from all GOY members, look forward to actually taking pics to lol

When the liner had settled we placed heavy stones around the edge putting the flatter ones where the shallow end was so that the frogs etc could get into and out of the water easlily and sometimes the birds used to bathe or come to drink from there they also used the tiered waterfall as well. Good luck with the rebuild Sanbaz. We had grass to half the edges too. I made a roackery one of the sides with only cracks for the plants to grow out of. The other edge was a flowerbed.

hi linda and thanx sounds a similar layout to mine, we are going to make sure the ground level is even again before starting, then also make sure we have a larger overlap this time, hubby getting more rocks to, once its settled we will place a pebble slope into water for wildlife and birds to get to water,:o)

I'm sure it will be fine this time round Sanbaz. We seem to get extreme bouts of rainfall these days. It's either not much at all or everything thrown down at once.

very true, fine at moment but not sure if its going to rain or if the sun will come out.

Yeah! Good for you San. My last garden pond was a ridgid affair. It was great, but hard to get it absolutely level. If i do one here it will be with a liner. I'm waiting to see how you get on before I start digging!! x

hi karen ive just been out digging a 22" overlap shelf before it slopes up so im hoping its going to be alot better, and 22"before grass starts and on a level with that, fingers crossed, got water to get out now :o(( lol

Whey hey!! Good for you!! I bet it will be smashing this time! I don't think it is the clay that is the problem San, I think (in my case) it is the compaction that is the problem! Been having April showers here all day and now it's completely grey - still, April showers bring spring flowers don't they?! The garden is looking quite pretty now and we will soon be out spending all day pottering, photographing and enjoying the bees and the scents and the pimms!!!! Then you will be able to look on the fruits of your hard work and smile! Cheers!

just had diner karen and need to get the liner in tonight as heavy rain forcast grrr, so dont want that damn hole filling up again, so if i get liner in that should stop water shouldnt it hahah, god i hope so,
glad your garden is starting to look pretty again but sorry your having showers, its surpose to be alot better from thursday till at least next tuesday, so they say, will see,,like you cant wait to potter and enjoy the garden, sit out having dinner and a glass or two :o)) x

Oh yes! happy days to come Sandra! Now...get out there and get that liner down!! tee hee!! ...then have a glass of wine!! x

put the liner in now karen in my new blog, so thats that i hope :o))