Ponds are a very good way of attracting wildlife into your garden. Dragonflies, damselflies, frogs, toads, newts and birds are just some of the creatures which will use a pond. Ponds provide a drinking, feeding or washing area for many creatures. Birds will for example drink from it, bathe in it or eat aquatic flower seeds and even small ponds have tremendous wildlife potential. By making a pond in your garden you will encourage creatures such as frogs, toads, hedgehogs and birds to visit, or even live in, your garden and in return they will eat slugs, snails and many other garden pests. Living in the pond itself, you will also discover many small interesting creatures including: water fleas, snails, flatworms, leeches, water boatmen, dragonfly larvae and tadpoles. Tadpoles, particularly, are very useful creatures to have in a pond. They are scavengers and will help to keep the pond free of algae and organic pond rubbish. Study all these pond creatures carefully!

Siting a Pond

When siting your pond bear in mind the following points:

• Site it well away from trees. Leaves falling into the pond will rot and use up the oxygen and thus kill off the pond life. Trees also cast shade. Ponds which are sited in a warm and sunny position attract more wildlife. The pond should be sited in a position where it will get a minimum of five hours of sunshine each day.

• Fence off the pond if you have a dog or young children. Dogs can quickly ruin a pond and young children can drown.

• Site the pond in a natural hollow if at all possible

• Try and create a wetland area on one side of the pond. Plant it with upright (emergent) plants. These will be used by emerging dragonflies.

Shape, Size and Construction

The size of your pond will depend on how much space you have available but generally larger ponds attract more wildlife into the garden. Four or five metres is a good size for a pond and the minimum depth should not be less than 0.75 metres to prevent it from freezing in the winter. Have a variety of depths in the pond with some shallower areas and make sure the sides are not too steep so that creatures can get in and out easily.

The shape should be made to fit in with your garden and is not really important.

Lining the Pond

There are many ways of constructing ponds but most use a pond liner of some sort. Suitable liners include:

• Puddled Clay
• Betonite (Pure Clay)
• Concrete
• Pre-moulded pond liners, obtained from garden centres. These tend to have very steep sides and be difficult to install.
• Polythene, PVC or Butyl Rubber - are flexible materials and can be used to cover a pre-dug hole. They are cheap, but not very long lasting. (They can be easily punctured.) Butyl Rubber will last the longest.

How to Construct a Pond

1. Mark out the shape of the pond - you can use a hosepipe or clothes line to do this.
2. Dig out the earth to a variety of depths - but not less than 0.75 metres at the shallowest point. Don't forget to allow extra depth for lining materials, soil etc.
3. Remove any sharp stones or glass from the pond area.
4. Cushion the pond area. Suitable materials include: folded newspapers, carpet underlay, or fine sand.
5. Place the liner on top of the cushioning material. Allow a good overlap around the edge of the pond and extra on one side if you are making a wetland area. Weight the lining down around the edges with bricks etc. Do not walk on the pond liner!
6. Place a pile of rocks at the deepest part of the pond to weigh down the lining and to provide a home for the pond creatures.
7. Fill the pond with water (Rain water is better than tapwater if you have it.)
8. Cut off extra pond liner, leaving an overlap of about 30 cm all around the edges, plus extra for the wetland area. The edges of the pond can be finished off tidily with paving stones or turf to allow access for study etc.
9. Add stone-free soil to the pond to cover the liner and leave the water to clear for a week before planting into this substrate. Plants can either be planted directly into the soil or placed on the surface of the soil in perforated pots.

Planting up Your Pond.

Use a variety of plant types in your pond e.g ones with erect stems, floating plants to provide shade and submerged plants to oxygenate the water.

Hardy water lilies always look very attractive in a pond. Their spreading leaves provide shade and by cutting off the sunlight, they help to keep the water clear of algae. Half to two thirds of the surface area should be covered in this way. Further information, on the types of water lilies available, can be obtained from: Ponds and Water Gardens. (See further reading.) In your pond, you will also need some water weeds which will oxygenate the water and provide a hiding place for wildlife. Water weeds also compete with pond algae for nutrients and if present help to keep the algae in check. The best time to plant up a pond is when the water is warm (May-August).

Some suitable pond plants are given in the tables below:

POND PLANTS

OXYGENATING PLANTS	SURFACE PLANTS	EMERGENT PLANTS
Hornwort (Ceratophyllum demersum)	Ivy-leaved Duckweed (Lemna trisulca)	Arrowhead (Sagittaria sagittifolia)
Spiked Water-Milfoil (Myriophyllum spicatum)	Fringed Water-Lily (Nymphoides peltata)	Bog Bean ( (Menyanthes trifoliata))
Water-Crowfoot (Ranunculus aquatilis)	Floating Water Plantain (Luronium natans)	Flowering Rush (Butomus umbellatus)
Water Starwort (Callitriche stagnalis)	Frog-bit (Hydrocharis morus-ranae)	Greater Spearwort (Ranunculus lingua)
Water Violet (Hottonia palustris)	Water-Crowfoot (Ranunculus aquatilis)	Water Violet (Hottonia palustris)
Willow Moss (Fontinalis spp.)	White Water Lily (Nymphaea alba)	Yellow Flag (Iris pseudacorus)
	Water Hawthorn (Aponogeton distachyus)	Monkey Flower (Mimulus guttatus)
	Golden Club (Orontium aquaticum)	Zebra Rush (Scirpus zebrinus)
	Water Hyacinth (Eichhornia crassipes)	Cat-Tails(Typha latifolia)

The Wetland Area

It is possible to construct a wetland area even if you do not have a pond. This may be a possibility if you have young children or a very small garden. This area needs to be kept permanently damp. Dig a hollow in the ground and cover it with polythene or PVC. Make a few drainage holes in the liner at the deepest point. Cover the liner with soil and plant the area with wetland plants selected from the table below. (If the wetland area is joined to the pond then do not make any drainage holes in the liner!)

WETLAND AREA PLANTS

Marsh Marigold (Caltha palustris)	Purple Loosestrife (Lythrum salicaria)	Yellow Loosestrife (Lysimachia vulgaris)
Water Mint(Mentha aquatica)	Common Valerian (Valeriana officinalis)	Water Forget-me-not (Myosotis scorpioides)
Bogbean (Menyanthes trifoliata)	Marsh Cinquefoil (Potentilla palustris)	Yellow Flag (Iris pseudacorus)
Angelica (Angelica sylvestris)	Cuckooflower (Cardamine pratense)	Hemp Agrimony (Eupatorium cannabinum)
Ragged Robin (Lychnis flos-cuculi)	Great Hairy Willowherb (Ephilobrium hirsutum)

Further Reading

1. Creating a Wildlife Garden by Bob and Liz Gibbons
   The water and marsh section (p128-143) of this book, has much useful information on how to make a wildlife pond. It is published by Hamlyn. Price £7.99 ISBN 0-600-56941-1

2. Ponds and Water Gardens by Bill Heritage. Cassell.
   This book has many excellent colour photographs of water lily species and other pond plants. An interesting little book which tells you what to do about algal growth, how to repair damaged ponds, how to construct a marginal area for emergent plants (p132), how to deal with icing in winter etc.