Hi all. I've been lurking here off and on for some time. I have always dreamed of having a garden pond with a waterfall. I started several years ago with a "turtle shaped" sand box abandoned by my children,lined with black plastic and surrounded by broken concrete chunks. This pond sat on top of a concrete slab cover for a dug well.(see pix)
Later I graduated to a 4' round kiddie pool, same design.
Now I'm ready to go bigger and actually dig a hole! My plan is to keep a pool on the dug well slab as an upper pool and having it run down into a pool dug into the ground in front with a built up "waterfall" replacing the hand pump. The in ground pool will be 6ft. in diameter and about 3ft. deep. (local pond center states 2-2.5ft is sufficient to over winter fish and lilies) I have an 1800gph submersible pump that I will run into a 26 gallon garbage can "skippy" filter that will set behind the waterfall. I plan on only having goldfish not koi. (koi are too finicky for me) I have the electrical all figured out and yes it's GFCI! My big question is in the walls of the in ground pool. I plan on having them near as straight as possible, but my soil is pretty sandy, at least at the surface. I'll know more when I start digging, but I'm thinking that I will need to have some reinforcing on the walls to keep them from caving in. I have added a pix of the site as it is now. If you can see it, I have a white line painted in the grass on the right side that is the outline of the pond. (Not painted on left yet do to need of plant removal) The right hand side surface level is 6" lower than the ground level at the corner of the dug well slab. I will either need to dig at the slab lower to equal the other side or build up the right side with blocks. I have some used housing bricks that I could use to reinforce the walls with. Do you think that would be enough or should I get cement blocks. If so what size? Any other recommendations would be appreciated. Thanks!....Char
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Image link: Requesting new pond opinions (58 k)
