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Mike Higgins Shares his Experiences Building his Pond and Waterfall.
Two things inspired me to build my pond/waterfall. The first was the Japanese Garden in
Washington Park west of downtown Portland.
I simply love the calming effect of the water features that wind through
the park. The second was the Hughes
Water Garden store on Stafford Road.
Once my wife and I discovered Hughes, I knew that it was possible for me
to build my own pond/waterfall and add a little of the aura of the Japanese
Garden in my own backyard.
We have a hill that slopes down into an area of our yard
that really needed to be developed. The
area is just off our back deck and the first area a person enters when stepping
down from the deck. But it wasn't very
attractive. I could picture water
naturally running down the slope of the hill and wanted to build something that
fit into the natural features of the yard.
My first step in building was to attend the Saturday morning
session on pond construction at Hughes.
Niki did a great job explaining the basics and answering
questions. I followed this up by buying
a couple of used books about pond/waterfall construction and searching the
Internet for helpful sites. Of the many
sites I discovered, I found a blog maintained by the Upstate Pond Doctor (owner
of Platinum Ponds in upstate New York) to be the most helpful.
Building the pond/waterfall took more time and hard work
than I imagined, but proceeded without too many difficulties. I laid out the design using a rope and checked
it from different perspectives. I think
the waterfall and pond are relatively proportionate in size to one another,
although the pond might have been a little bigger. I knew I didn't want fish, so the deepest
part of the pond is about 2 feet deep. I
added a bog at one end of the pond where I hope grasses will grow and serve as
a screen to the pathway to the back part of our yard. The pond/waterfall is beneath a deciduous
tree so I added a skimmer, but didn't feel the need to add a UV light. Niki was a big help in guiding me in making the
right choices regarding pump, skimmer, rubber pond liner, etc.
The two biggest construction issues I faced related to
getting a water tight seal as I set rock.
On the waterfall, I faced the biggest problems at points where I wanted
to divert the water and it wanted to go straight. I had enough rubber liner under the rocks but
I had to spend a lot of time sealing the rocks so the water didn't escape the
system. I found stop leak, quick drying
mortar helpful in finally solving this issue.
My second issue related to setting the rock at the edge of the
pond. I wanted the bottom of the rocks
to sit in about an 1/8" inch of water so that they appeared to be partially
submerged. What finally helped me with
this design feature was to imagine a very shallow shelf around the pond that
the edge rocks sat in. I angled the
shelf towards the water and occasionally had to seal behind the rocks.
As I made progress with the project, I started to think I
was doing an okay job with the construction details and with those parts of the
pond that were below water level.
However, I became worried about visible features of the pond and the
aesthetics of the entire thing. My wife
was of tremendous assistance during this phase.
Oftentimes I'd have to admit that I didn't want to listen to her and to
move a rock yet a third or fourth time, but I'm glad I did. Her advice greatly improved the final
design. She also had the idea of having
Annie from Hughes come to our home and give us advice on plants. I remember how delighted I was with the
immediate results of one of Annie's suggestions: she suggested we add a downed tree limb to
the landscape next to the pond. As soon
as I did, the entire project opened up into much more than a simple
pond/waterfall. It became an integral
part of the surrounding area. Of course,
Annie made a number of other suggestions about trees, bushes, and grasses to
plant. One hour of her time really made
a big difference to the outcome of the project.
We finished the project in the early fall. I'm now looking forward to a summer's worth
of growth to our plantings. I'm also
looking forward to sitting at pond's edge, drinking a glass of wine with my
wife and enjoying our piece of paradise.
Mike Higgins
 
Hughes is looking for customers that would like to share their experience building a pondless urn or bubbling rock water feature.
Contact us at store@hugheswatergardens.com.
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Great Gifts at Hughes
Don't forget that water gardener for
the holidays.
1. Gift Certificates
2. Rain Chains 15% off
3. Pottery for that pondless feature project
scheduled for next year.
4. Wind Chimes 15% off
5. UV lights for the water gardener that hates
green algae.
6. Evergreen pond plants for year round water
gardening.
7. Pond lights.
8. Floating Islands.
9. Bamboo accents - Self contained bamboo
fountains (pump included). 15% off
10. Waterfall Pumps for that project next year.
11. Fountains
12. Pond Filters
13. Pottery
14. ScareCrow - motion detector sprinklers to scare off the Heron and Raccoons.
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IMPORTANT NOTICE ON NEW HOURS
Hughes changes to winter hours
Monday - Friday 10 to
5Saturday - 10 to 3Sunday & Monday Closed
We are beginning a new and exciting chapter at Hughes
this winter. We have decided to redesign sections of the nursery and create
sample vignette gardens. These gardens will give you inspiration for your own
projects and also make your visit to Hughes all the more rewarding. Our plant
palette and stone supplies will also increase dramatically for Spring 2010 so
keep reading your newsletter for our "Grand Opening" date.
In our February newsletter we will include some exclusive special discount
coupons available to our loyal customers and newsletter readers . These will be
redeemable during the week following our official opening of the new gardens.
We are so excited to get started on this expansion and look forward to
sharing it all with you in the Spring.
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