Ready to get your feet wet in water gardening? Before you run out to buy water lilies and fish, you need to ask yourself a few questions. To help you make the right choices, we spoke to pond experts. Here’s what they had to say:
Q What can I do on a tight budget?
J .R. Zibrun, Aquascape Inc.: Complete pond kits begin at $799 for everything including the liner, mechanical “skimmer,” filter biological filter, plumbing, pump, starter treatments, etc. The only things you need to buy are the boulders and gravel. There are some alternatives to a pond that people can create in their back yard as well. For example, they could create a bubbling fountain out of a basalt column. Assembling all of the components would put them at a retail price of around $500. This is a great alternative for someone who wants a smaller feature or something a bit more formal looking.
For a professionally installed pond and waterfall, the typical starting price is about $2,900.
Q What if I need help with a design?
Robert Milani, Chalet: Landscape architects generally charge $100 to $150 per hour to create a design. Typically on a smaller water feature it would take from three to five hours. The plan would be comprehensive in nature. We identify materials, plumbing, give elevation of what the waterfall would look like and a scale drawing of the pond. Or you can go by a flat fee. The landscape architect would actually quote a flat fee of $300 or $400 for the design, so the homeowner knows upfront what the cost is and gets a detailed plan.
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Q Should I do it myself or have it done?
Zibrun: Most back-yard ponds (8 feet wide by 11 feet long) can be done by the average homeowner in a matter of a couple of weekends. When you start getting larger than that, it’s always best to call in a certified installer to take a look at the situation and give you advice, if nothing else, and to see if it’s a feasible alternative to have somebody else do it. Usually, what happens is do-it-yourselfers create a worse situation by trying to do it themselves on the larger projects, and it winds up costing them more in the long run. You can’t be afraid to lift some boulders and dig some holes. I always recommend at least two people working on it.
Milani: Keep it simple, do not take anything on that is too complex or takes too much effort. When you get into a larger project, you want the expertise of a landscape architect to plan and engineer it out.
Q How long is it going to take to install?
Sharon Bretl-Marrin, Bret-Mar Landscape Inc.: Smaller ponds take a day to install with a crew of about four or five guys.
Q What about local building codes?
Zibrun: The most important thing is the BOCA (Building Officials and Code Administrations) code states that any body of water less than 24 inches in depth is still considered temporary landscaping. Beyond that, it will fall into a category of a swimming pool. If you stick to 24 inches or less you are safe under normal conditions. Always check local ordinances.
In situations where you have strict ordinances against open bodies of water, pondless waterfalls are perfect. There are no liability issues.
Q Will my plan require additional electrical circuits?
Zibrun: We always recommend people hire electricians to install ground fault outlets near the pond. Underwater lights are low-voltage, usually a sealed beam. You can see fish dance in and out of the beam of light. Don’t forget to light the waterfall — that’s the best part.
Q How much baby-sitting will it take?
Zibrun: The proper mix of plants, fish, circulation, rocks, gravel makes it 95 percent maintenance free. If you do it right the first time, you can boil it down to about five to 10 minutes a week. That includes adding beneficial bacteria, filling it up with water and emptying out the debris net once a week
Milani: The only issue of water gardens, especially ponds, is a higher level of maintenance. They have to be cleaned regularly. That’s a feature some people shy away from. But in the same vein, a lot of new ponds mimic a swimming pool where the system has a skimmer bucket. All the surface debris, like leaves, falls in; it’s concentrated in a filter bag and emptied.
Bretl-Marrin: Your biggest maintenance will be in spring, early April. You do a spring clean-out, pumping the water out of the pond, catching the fish and putting them in a holding pond on the side, power-wash the stones, reset any stones you want to reset. Throughout the summer, you are going to check it once a week. Check the skimmer basket. Maybe leaves and debris have blown into it. You have to add more water because of natural evaporation. It takes about five or 10 minutes once a week.
Q Will I create a mosquito factory?
Zibrun: Mosquitoes cannot lay their eggs in moving water. As long as you have it set up with moving circulation, mosquitoes cannot inhabit it.
Q What’s the best location for a pond?
Zibrun: As close to any outdoor living area. For example, if you had a back deck, you want it to be directly adjacent to that. You want to bring it as close to the living areas as possible, because you are going to be drawn to it and interacting on a regular basis. Position the waterfall so that the water will always be flowing toward the house. The reason for that is it allows you to enjoy it when you are inside the house as well. It’s always easier to install one on a level area, but if you have any type of grade change where the ground slopes off, you can use that to create a natural-looking waterfall.
They can be put in either sun or shade. You want about 50 percent shade on your pond during the day. If your pond is in full sun, you can use plants such as water lilies to shade the water surface. It cuts down on the algae. Direct sunlight will spur algae growth.
Bretl-Marrin: If the ground doesn’t slope away, we can build it up. The idea is to look as natural as possible. We don’t want it to look like a molehill with water coming out.