In article , Roz Cawley
writes
I was thrilled when I had a new wildlife pond and bog garden installed a
couple of weeks ago - but not so thrilled to see that the landscape
gardener had lined the pond with the subsoil that he had excavated from
"the hole" - because our subsoil happens to be horrible, yellow clay,

I thought you wanted a bog garden?

unlike the better, though sandy topsoil that he buried/left in a heap at
the side of the garden :-((.

What would you have *wanted* him to do with this?

Two weeks later, and the pond water still has a murky, yellow cloudiness

As the murkiness from the soil diminishes, you will get a build up of
algae which will make the pond appear equally murky. This is quite
normal in a new pond and will clear. It can take up to three years, in
some cases, for a pond to clear naturally.

- which I assume is the suspension of fine clay particles still floating
around in it.

We set in a small pond last year and it has taken about a year for it
to clear - and it was a plastic pond which we did our best to keep soil
out of, not entirely successfully.
The best way with a pond it to make sure you have plenty of surface
hugging plants and lots of patience. Work with nature - forget
chemicals.
--
Jane Ransom in Lancaster.
I won't respond to private emails that are on topic for urg
but if you need to email me for any other reason,
put jandg dot demon dot co dot uk where you see deadspam.com