Garden ponds
The ponds in our Gardens will usually be on a hillside.
A round or kidney-shaped pond wouldn't be very practical on a slope, so it may be best use channel ponds, each channel being a little further down the slope from the last. This also create a slight water current.
While the shape of these ponds is not very natural: look around, you won’t find ponds on a sloping hill, but mainly in a valley or on a hill top. To be able to have ponds in the gardens, we need to work with the contours of the hill and have a gravity feed.
The picture on the right shows a cut through of how the ponds would lay on the hill.
Some possible pond shapes:
a) stairs b) circle c) random d) arrow
In and around the pond we can grow a wide variety of native plants, as well as edible non-native plants, and so create a beautiful, plentiful haven for us and for wildlife. The plants will soon soften the edges of the ponds, making them feel more natural.
In addition to the main pond, having some small water features spread over the garden makes it easier for water loving animals to move around and make themselves at home. Frogs and newts are very helpful predators of slugs and snails. Birds and small mammals can also make use of them as watering places.
The streams leading to and from the main pond can be widened in places to form pools. Other small ponds or bogs could be made in places where water wells up naturally, or in damp shady spots.