Thread: Filling in pond
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Old 07-01-2003, 08:33 PM
Warwick Michael Dumas
 
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Default Filling in pond

"Martin Sykes" wrote in message ...
"Pia" wrote in message
...


Now, what do we fill it with? The pond is a couple of feet deep, and I
don't know if we need to fill the whole lot with soil, or whether it will

be
ok to put a bit of rubble in the bottom to reduce the volume of soil

needed?
I can't think why that wouldn't be OK but remember that the soil will wash
down to fill the gaps in the rubble so expect it to settle quite a bit at
first.


I've found rubble in clay tends to prevent drainage. I've got a pond
which I hate (I'm replacing it with quite a nice kidney shaped one
with nice grey bricks round the edge, going down below the waterline)
and I'm going to put sand over the rubble until it's all covered. That
way it should improve drainage.

Also, which kind of soil do we need. Do we just get "standard" soil from

a
nursery, or do we mix it with compost (or something else altogether)?

I'd put something cheap and poor at the bottom and then fill the last foot
or so with something better. There's no point putting expensive compost
where the plants won't use it. I'm not sure from your post how deep the pond
is though.


If you're having 1-2 feet of rockery above it then that sounds about
right. I think two feet of earth below any plants has got to be a good
idea. Don't get it from a nursery if you can help it; this is what I
did and found they charge an extortionate price. If you can wait until
they're at work again, someone told me the best thing is to drive
around and find where men are laying paving. They actually throw away
loads of lawn turf and the like, and will normally bring it round,
maybe for a small fee.

I'm having a real stress about ponds at the moment. I *kNEED* to get
the new pond built because I've collected more than a ton of
poor-quality earth (that I'll use for a middle layer in filling up the
old one) and left it sitting bang in the middle of my patio bit where
I need to fiddle with greenhouse tables! Nor can I lay power cables
with it in the way and I want to start using my propagator by
February. Aaarghh! If anyone's got a giant fold-up winch that can move
about 1500-2000 kgs do let me know.


Warwick Dumas

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