I’ve been thinking about putting a small pond at the highest point on the property, above the gardens, as an irrigation source and to have some fish. I bought a liner a couple of months ago. Today, some helpers and I finally set to it.

Turns out 9- and 10-year olds will dig for over an hour! You can see that down below the topsoil layer its very shaly chunky rock. I saved the topsoil and re-built a raised bed with it.

First we’d laid out where the pond was going to be located. This was a space I’d raked leaves into a pile last fall, roughly circular. Then from one end of this we built a spillway that would carry overflow into the topmost swale. We found the digging much easier here so decided to put another, deeper pit down that end.

Next, we needed to do something to protect the liner from sharp rocks. I sent the helpers out to find carpet scraps in the neighborhood, which they promptly found (along with 60 beanie babies at a garage sale). I laid the carpet over the various sections and used a box cutter to cut the shapes.

The scale here is the two main pits are about 5′ by 5′ and the spillway is about 6′ by 2′. The top depression is about 16″ deep and the lower one about 28″ deep. I’m hoping this will be deep enough to avoid freezing so fish can overwinter.

Next comes the liner.

The liner’s 15′ long by 10′ wide, and didn’t quite cover the whole spillway, so I needed to cut an additional piece for the spillway. I’m planning to make a constructed wetland in the spillway with sand and gravel, so I still need to find a way to seal the overlap of the two pieces of liner.

Finally, the moment of truth!

And here it is finally filled. Tomorrow after it has settled for a bit, I’ll trim the excess liner, and line the edge with flagstones.