Our original pond with the steep sides and the over hanging rocks, no shallow beach area and no bog plants. We had put in some hedgehog ladders but we weren't happy with it and we wanted a more natural look.

Having removed the old pond we were left with a hole and it was then just a case of marking out where we wanted the new pond to be and using the soil from the new pond area to back fill the old pond. With the new pond area marked out on the ground we then dug down in several steps so that we could get our planting ledges and planting pockets. Notice the use of wooden pegs and a spirit level to get our water levels correct, we didn't want to flood the lawn! Some of the excess soil was put at the back of the pond for the planned sleeper alpine rockery.

The pond digging complete with planting ledges and beach area and the alpine rockery area behind.

A layer of smooth sand was put over the soil to help prevent the pond liner from being punctured from any stones in the soil underneath.

On top of the sand layer we placed an additional layer of pond underlay as further protection for the new pond liner.

The butyl pond liner was then put in place over the pond underlay, notice that it was bought much bigger than the pond width and length. You need this larger size to get the liner into all the ledges and the depth of the pond, most pond liner suppliers will have a calculator that will tell you what size liner you will need for your size of pond. Notice also that Jonathan is on the liner in socks to prevent any thing caught in the treads of his wellies from puncturing the liner.

Once the pond liner was in place we then put another layer of pond underlay over the liner. The reason for this was that we wanted the pond to have a very natural look with a rocky edge and bottom using the rocks to form natural planting pockets. the underlay helps to protect the liner from being punctured by the rocks that were placed on top of it.

We started from the centre of the pond adding in the rocks and creating planting pockets with the rocks and the ledges. Most of the rocks were held in place by the weight of other rocks rather like building a dry stone wall. Only on a couple of occasions we used an expanding foam to hold the odd rock in place. Some rocks as you can see bottom right were back filled with fine gravel or small pebbles to give them support.

We left the liner and underlay uncut around the edges until we had completely finished getting all the rock in place and the final planting pockets for the bog plants.

More planting ledges were added with the aquatic soil in place and the pebbled beach. You can see the Bog bean planted in its pocket at the far end. The water in the bottom was not intentional at that point, that was the result of rain over night. We feel that the rocks give a much more natural look to the pond and the nooks and crannies created by the rocks give wonderful locations for the frogs and newts to hang out and hide in under water.

All the under water planting levels are now finished with the plants planted in the planting pockets with gravel over the aquatic soil to stop it from being washed into the water. The top planting layer is for the bog plants that don't like to be in the water but like a very moist damp soil. As you can see we were then filling up the pond with water to check that we had indeed got our levels correct which thankfully we had. The water for the pond was pumped out of the 6 water butts that we have fitted to the down pipes from the house, garage and workshop. It is much better if you can use natural rain water to fill up your pond rather than using mains water which has chlorine added to it.

With the water in place we could check that our levels were correct for the shallow beach area and then get the bog plants in place. Notice how we had started to cut back the the liner and the underlay. We found that you can cut the liner with a knife but you need a pair of good tough sharp scissors to cut the underlay as a knife just wouldn't touch it.

The finished pond with a few more rocks to break up the bog planting area and gravel & pebbles covering the bog planting soil. As you can see there are no steep sides as there was with the old pond and should a hedgehog fall in the sides are all fairly shallow so that they should easily climb out. We had initially thought of the Alpine rockery extending all the way around the back end of the pond to the right to act as a retaining wall for the soil which is higher at that point in the garden. However we decided that there was enough rock around the pond and that we wanted a contrast to it. We had just inherited and old anchor that came from Frank's mums garden. Jonathan had one of those light bulb moments laying in bed one night and came up with the idea of a wooden quay as a retaining wall using some old sleepers that we purchased from a local reclamation yard and the wooden mooring post was fashioned from an old fence post in Jonathan's workshop.

The new wildlife pond in May 2021 just 6 months after we finished the pond and the plants are just starting to flourish.

The new wildlife pond in June 2021, just 7 months after we finished the pond. The Marsh Marigold and Cuckoo flower are well in flower. The water Starwort and Water crowfoot are growing apace and the Purple Loosestrife and the Yellow Irises are shooting well. The Water Lilly is just showing its new leaves.

The new wildlife pond in August 2021 now looking quite well established.