Building a pond - step by step - mostly complete post71

[TLWR]

Quote:
Just ducks. They will make enough of a mess and the fish would want some plants for cover and I think the ducks would eat those. We may have to toss in some mosquito fish, but we'll see, hopefully the ducks take care of that.

 

[gofasterstripe]

Have the dogs tried to get in for a cool dip yet...you will have to take photos when they do coz Summer is going to get mighty hot and a nice cool pool is every dogs dream

 

[DurhamDuck]

This has to be one of my favorite threads! I am totally enjoying your journey to creating this wonderful pond for you ducks! Keep the photos coming please!!

 

[WestKnollAmy]

How wonderful!

I love the photos of the ducks sticking their heads up over the side to ask if it is ready!

Mine do that when I fill their big pool.

Oh, how I wish I could get my act together to do that but I already have too many projects.

 

[Enchanted Sunrise Farms]

Wow, it's a big dog water bowl.

i'm loving this thread, too. That will be a fabulous duck pond when it's all set up. My ducks will be jealous.

 

[Duckchick2011]

I LOVE YOUR DUCK POND, it is sooo beautiful...

How much did it cost to make? How much time? How much work...can one person manage alone?
I am seriously considering making one for my own ducks.

It will be filled with water plants, coi, and ducks...and it will have a waterfall

...

I really do love your design, its something I can make that my neighbors won't be put off by, such a perfect little duck pool.

 

[TLWR]

Quote:
Don't have a final number yet, but more than I was expecting as we started going with it and upgraded here and there

At least 10x more than their $30 walmart pool though!!

I'll try to get a close total when we are done and have returned the bits we didn't use and whatnot.

Time - I had the boards cut and leveled and stacked in an afternoon on my own.
Next day I needed DH's help to cut rebar (was cheaper than getting them smaller and they didn't have the size I wanted anyway) and he also did all the drilling for rebar and helped me sledge them all in. You'll want help getting the rebar in or plan on taking a while to do a few pieces a day. We are going into rock hard clay and we have the holes drilled in the wood to the same size as the rebar, so you really have to work to get the rebar into the timbers. A larger hole would be easier, but then there would be room for movement.
I put the sand and smoothed that out and then laid out the liner and cut in a drain and installed that plumbing. Set for 24 hours, fill, look for leaks, finish filling, find leak in the morning and fix leak and fill again. Wait a few days to be sure no leaks and everything is good and settled and then start making corners neat and tacking the liner.
DH helped with the top boards, but easily done on my own (he just helped me line up corners so I could do the next cut and then helped me shim them so they were sort of level and attached them.
Steps were done in an hour (plus time to head to Lowes to get the screws we needed that I couldn't find in our garage pile (also sealing the garage floor right now, so the contents of the garage are in a pile outside the garage - making it hard to find anything).

The liner for the filter arrived today and I'll wait until Dh gets home to work on that (doing other stuff now anyway). Should be able to get the holes drilled in the timbers and rebar put in. Once that is done, I'll lay in the liner and fill it (no drain in this one, DH doesn't want to bother with a drain in the filter box and will just use a sump pump when I need to clean it - whatever, easier for me to not cut in a drain or dig to install that plumbing lol)
We'll test it out to see where our slate for the waterfall needs to go and then drain some water out to let the waterfall area dry and then attach the slate and let cure for 24 hours before hooking it all up to go again.


So most can be done alone, but I very much appreciated the help with the rebar. I already have trouble with my shoulder and putting in ~35 pieces of 40" rebar wouldn't help that if I did it all alone.
And drilling the holes for it is easier if somebody is sitting on the timbers or otherwise applying pressure while the person will the drill is going through all the holes (we did the entire stack at once so it was a tight fit and everything would be perfectly lined up. Maybe I'll take a pic of that tonight while DH is drilling... or he can if he lets me use his new drill bit!


Major costs - approximate
$100 - timbers @ $3 each
$100 - main pond liner (10x15 45 mil EPDM) - included shipping
$100 - pump (we upgraded here, but I think it was a wise place to be sure we had good stuff
$80 - 13 pieces of 10' rebar that we cut into 3 pieces that I think we could have cut into 4 pieces instead
$25 - filter liner (8x10 20mil pvc) - included shipping
$60 - plumbing (drain, piping, tubing for pump to filter, etc)
holy crap, I should stop adding now

$30 - underlayment for pond and filter
$40 - top boards for pond/filter
$20 - filter supplies (we have some stuff laying around we can use as well, so we didn't have to buy everything)
$15 - pool skimmer to get stuff out of it
$30 - prefilter box (box to put pump in and prefilter the water before going to the filter box
$35000 - sand

(ok, we had the sand left over from having the garage built this spring, so we didn't have to buy any sand for leveling or a base

)


So it's looking like it is around $600. Crap - the schools better call me a few more times to sub before school is out next week to pay for all that
If I don't count any plants I'll buy to put around it or the possible addition of 2 new ducklings later this summer, maybe

(<--- that could just as easily be a duckling as it is a chick)

 

[veronicasmom]

Those Dane pics are all beautiful, but I LOVE LOVE LOVE the one with the Dobe and Greyhound too.
That pond is going to be so nice. I would love to do that, but if I ask hubby to do one more animal project right now, I think he will burst into a flame!!!! However, someday maybe.......................................

 

[chickbird]

Quote:
Just ducks. They will make enough of a mess and the fish would want some plants for cover and I think the ducks would eat those. We may have to toss in some mosquito fish, but we'll see, hopefully the ducks take care of that.

HOW DO YOU PLAN ON KEEPING THE ALGAE DOWN, AS IT USUALLY GROWS EVEN WITH A FILTER UNLESS THE WATER IS CHLORINATED OR WATER LILLIES PUT IN ?

 

[Kelsey2017]

A onion (mesh) bag filled with barley straw will keep algae from growing. If you live in a farmy type place you can by it by the bale sometimes and fill your own bags or you can order it from pond suppliers. They sell small sachets to horse folks at exorbitant prices for stock tanks. They work quite well, I didn't have to scrub out my trough once last summer. It is an enzyme that the barley releases into the water that prevents algae from growing, but it is safe for animals, fish, etc.