As soon as I got an allotment one of my main aims was to have a wildlife pond. I sort of see it as a little bit of my responsibility to create somewhere for British wildlife if I have the space. So as soon as I made my way to the bottom of the allotment list, pond ideas were running through my mind as well as hours worth of research.
It's now been a month since I created my pond. So I thought I would go through what I did, which didn't really cost me much at all, was pretty easy to create and has created the exact results I was after.
Step 1. Research, research, research. That's pretty much all I did for 2 months. I took notes and wrote down the things I needed to, but really, what I discovered was it was all pretty self explanatory, even though I'd never done it before.
Step 2. Plan it out on the ground. I had the perfect sunny fairly sheltered spot at the top left corner of my allotment. Research basically told me I needed to make sure I was able to get the depths I wanted for the wildlife I want.
I turned over the soil for the area where I wanted my pond, making sure to remove anything sharp and roots. I then mapped it out with bricks around the outside and checked to make sure the land was level.
Step 3. My husband helped me out a lot with this bit to be honest, but it was ultimately just a few hours of digging it out. I wanted my pond around 2 metres long and about a metre wide at it's widest. I sort of wanted it a bit of a bean shape though, just to make it a little more interested. I also wanted a slope/beach area for things to easily climb out.
Make sure you create several levels. I have gone to 60cm deep at the deepest. This is so things can hibernate at the bottom should they wish (Toads possibly) I then have a shelf at around 30cm deep for marginal plants, and then in the middle it slopes up to between 30cm deep and 15cm deep. This again was for various marginal plants. I also put the slope in at the thinnest part of the pond. What helped with ours was the soil is clay soil. So the shape stayed perfectly in place. I did see a few things that said if your soil is more fine and comes away easier, then to use a wet builders sand to help shape it. Thankfully I didn't have this issue, which did help keep costs down.
Step 4. Time to fill the pond!! I had a look in various garden centres and pond liner is expensive! So I went to my usual shop: Amazon. I found a supplier of pond liner which was ideal. It was £30 and came with a free pond protector for underneath the liner to cushion it a little more from any sharp rocks etc that may have gone unnoticed. We then literally just lay the liner over, folded it as best we could into the various crevices, then let the weight of the water do the rest. Hose went it, and about an hour later the pond was full.
Step 5. Once the pond was full, we had to hide the liner. We trimmed it back to about a foot all around, dug a fairly shallow trench all the way around for it to dip into and then cover again with the clay soil. One issue we did come across because of the soil was it tried to retain water where it initially slopped over the sides, and became quite boggy - you can sort of see it at the bottom left of the pond. While I was ok with having a bog I didn't really want it there as it made the edges of the pond really unstable, so we stabbed through the liner a few times where it lipped over the top so the water would drain through. This fixed the problem fairly quickly. While the soil is a clay, it actually drains pretty well.
Once we had covered the edges in the soil we put down the pebbles on the beach area, they sort of gently slope down so things will be able to climb out.
Step 6. Time for the pond plants! I didn't have a clue what I was looking for. So I looked around at a few of our garden centres and they were useless. A very small selection and quite expensive. I then started looking online again. I found a few one website that seemed really good, but it was so expensive and delivery was £25! So I kept looking and came across a website called Bromfield Aquatics. They were great! Huge selection, and after my research I found I really needed some oxygenators, marginals and some top cover for things to hide under. So I emailed them, and within an hour a lovely lady got back in touch telling me what selection to go for and why. She was really helpful, so a few days later I placed my order. I wanted all British natives. The only native I didn't get was the lily- but I was told the British National lilies were really big. So all the plants you can see below (and 6 pond snails) cost £35 + £8 delivery - a huge difference to the approximate £100 I was going to spend for the same things on the other website I found.
Step 7. Time to put in the plants! Mine came with the baskets as well, so all I had to buy was some aquatic compost (which I found in B&Q for £4.99) and it was as simple as that. Make sure on top of the baskets you place a few rocks/pebbles to help way the baskets and soil down. Around the outside of the pond I then planted a few different kinds of grasses, scattered some grass seeds and wildflower seeds, and haven't touched it since.
This photo is my pond today! A month after creation and it's doing really well. We had an algal bloom the other day, it lasted about 5 days but has now cleared (I read the algae fed off the nitrogen, and when it uses it all up it just dies- this is why you don't want fish in a wildlife pond as not only do they eat everything but they also create a lot of nitrogen- apparently!) So as you can see my pond plants are doing really well, the grass has taken around the outside and a few flowers are slowly starting to pop up. There are no boggy areas and despite having had a lot of rain over the last few weeks the level of the water in the pond hasn't changed.
We have already seen pond-skaters, a water beetle, there's some tadpoles in there and I spotted a few of the water snails this morning. A silty layer has started to build on the bottom and we placed several sized rocks in the pond to create somewhere for things to hide which always helps. I've also put some upturned terracotta pots around the outside, so once everything starts to grow and it's a warm summers day it will give the frogs somewhere to hide.
It's safe to say I am totally in love with it! It's just so fascinating and it's different every time I go! It's amazing how they just sort of bed in and things just start to appear in it! I think the key is to just not be too protective and let nature do it's job!
Pond costs:
Liner and underlay: £30 (inc delivery)
Pond plants: £43 (inc delivery)
1 20litre bag of aquatic compost: £4.99
3 bags of white pebbles: £18
Grass and wildflower seeds: £9
So for not much over £100 I was able to create a place for me to relax next to, but most importantly to feed and attract local wildlife.
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