[CraigL83]

This has been a work in progress for a long wgile...Me and my father have been wanting to build a pond together but since i live 3 hours from my parents house, we had very limited time to really work on it. Their backyard has a very nice slope that runs across/away from the house. So we wanted to work the natural landscape into a river/waterfall effect into the pond. They also have a pool that has a natural looking waterfall feature. So we also wanted to somehow incorporate that into the design. Here are a few pics... In this first photo you cant really see it but beyond the white post in the background is the waterfall from the pool. So if you are standing at the bottom of the pond it looks as though the waterfall from the pool is connected to the water fall of the pond giving it the effect as though it was one massive stream running through the backyard.

Here are a few nicer pics that i took with my dslr....

 

[zer0zax]

Wow! I can tell from the different pics that stuff has really grown in! Someday I will have a pond...I really like the way you guys planted the trees around the pond, it looks natural and shady. I've heard that cleaning leaves from nearby trees is a pain, but getting that shady overhang look is so worth it!

Congratulations on your use of space, the pool really does appear to flow down into the pond. It really looks like your dad's yard and rockwork was built around a natural stream, not the other way around! All of your guy's planning really paid off

 

[ed seeley]

That looks amazing! Great job. It's going to be a pain to clean around all those rocks though! It looks amazingly natural.

 

[CraigL83]

well we set it up so that during the main part of the season it is a run through system so it is constanly changing water. We hooked a kold steril filter up to a float valve in the skimmer box and have an emergency overflow plumbed to the drainage line in the back yard. when the season is in full swing we set the float valve in the skimmer box to be just above the emergency overflow. This enables us to constantly be feeding new kold-steril filtered water in 24/7. I dont live there so cleaning the leaves isnt my problem. thats all on my pops! hahah

 

[mulita]

very nice set up, it looks great. Congrats

 

[CraigL83]

thanks here are a few shots i took with my camera i use when i go diving. I just kinda got down on my belly stuck my arms in and shot blindly.

 

[mulita]

Great underwater pictures! It looks very natural at all, you did a very good job building it. did you use plastic film to build it? or it was concrete?

 

[CraigL83]

we free formed it and used a liner. We went back and forth about putting down a concrete slab in the center to rest a large boulder on in order to make a center island. We decided against the idea since it would take away from the appearance of a natural stream.

 

[zer0zax]

Nice pics! 10 stars!

 

[CraigL83]

thank you here are a few more photos from this past summer of some of the other life in or around the pond.

And here is photo from my mothers garden which is just beyond the pond...She got some nice sized veggies this year!!

 

[greenjoe]

Superb photography! My favorite one is the dragonfly, it looks as though he is posing for the photo, looking directly at the camera.

 

[cotranchau_vn]

Fantastic pics. That's awesome, I love it. How do you deal with the winter?

 

[CraigL83]

i have a quick disconnect hooked up to the UV and the Kold steril. So i just take them off and bring them inside for the winter. Then we pull out the pump that drives the waterfall and the UV...flush the lines and put a piece of PVC with unions in its place so that no water can get into the pipes to freeze. Then we drain the pond down a few inches and put a net over it to catch the leaves that fall. Finally, we have a heater that will melt a hole when the surface ices over.

 

[zer0zax]

You guys thought of everything! Even a net for leaves, I will have to remember that. Nice photos as always, I really like the frog and pads. The insect pics show insane detail, I swear I can see individual eyes on the compound eyes.

 

[Jareardy]

I have to ask, what kind of camera is that?

 

[CraigL83]

canon eos rebel xt with a cannon 100mm macro lense for most of those shots.

 

[4f1hmi]

Outstanding Job You Guys Did! The 3 Hour Drive Is Worth It

 

[maddyfish]

Nice clear water, very nice.

 

[mulita]

I felt so really inspired by this thread about building a pond with my father, that I built a 9' kerung wood garden bridge for him as a christmas present to suggest the construction

it wasnt that hard as he was about to ask me for the bridge any way [smilie=b: so starting new year we will start the construction.

I hope it end up in something as nice as this one is. Could you provide some detail about filtration system that you are using?

 

[CraigL83]

the filtration is mainly just the water fall with the standard bio media in the over flow box at the top of the falls. Then we have a pump that pumps water from the skimmer box up to the overflow to create the water flow. From that pump we split off a "T" to the main UV which is an 80W sterilizer. The output of that connects to a 25 watt UV ( the frog that spits water from its mouth) that lets us create surface agitation in this one area of the pond that is stagnant. Finally we plumbed in a hose bib from the sprinkler system. From there we connected a Kold-steril filter. The output of the Kold-steril connects to a mechanical float (like found in a toilet res) that is connected inside the skimmer box. When the water is low in the pond the float drops which opens the waterflow rom the kold-steril...filling the pond with filtered water.
Also i forgot to metion that we put a ball valve in front of the UV in order to regulate the flow through the UV....that pretty much sums it all up