Thread: Water garden/veg filter construction

Just starting my pond revamp which will consist of raising the existing pond height by 230mm and adding a pond garden to sit above the pond, levels wise, with some sort of spillway running back into the main pond, this add on will be 600-900mm deep, question is once built do I sit the plant baskets on the bottom or do I need to create a void by using grills, I’ve looked at some man made planters that have this void so the water comes in at the bottom and rises up to go back in the pond via the spillway but on these designs only the bottom of the basket is below water level, I was thinking more of proper pond plants that are completely immersed in the water, further to this do I need to put built in shelves around the inner edge to allow me to grow a variety of plants?
strangely there is very little info on the net regarding building such an add on.
very roughly this new part of the pond will be 1.6 by 1.2 and a min of .6 deep so a fair amount of water, plan at the mo is feed this via my skimmer, through a tempest and a uv so I can then turn it off in the coldest months and not drop my water temp down with the spillway running.
any thoughts please?

can only speak of my experiences any plants that the koi can get at they will have a chew.
you could try a shallow ledge with the plant baskets just above water level.

keith

This is to be a separate pond sitting above my existing pond only linked by a spillway purely for plants as a natural bio filter so the fish can’t get to the plants.
really in two minds with it, from the pics of my original build I can see the stone level which I need to go down to before I can build anything, this will be 8-900mm down from what will be the new top of pond, that’s deep enough to actually extend my pond and maybe incorporate shelves around the edge for plants might be of more benefit in the long run.

hi
you could buy floating pond baskets and anchor them to the side that way plant baskets are just above water level and the little monsters can not chew them..
keith

On my pond I built a planted area which acts as a bog filter. There’s a wall just below the surface of the water so it looks like one big pond, but the koi can’t get in and destroy the plant’s. It’s fed from the skimmer in the main pond through filters and back into the bog filter via the waterfall.
The plant’s are just sitting on the bottom and have thrived, to such an extent I’m going to cut some off them back next year. The pond has been up and running for just over two years.

Originally Posted by Martin59

On my pond I built a planted area which acts as a bog filter. There’s a wall just below the surface of the water so it looks like one big pond, but the koi can’t get in and destroy the plant’s. It’s fed from the skimmer in the main pond through filters and back into the bog filter via the waterfall.
The plant’s are just sitting on the bottom and have thrived, to such an extent I’m going to cut some off them back next year. The pond has been up and running for just over two years.

Perfect that mate, can I ask how deep the planted area is?
i want to achieve something similar but mine will be 250mm above the main pond and run in via a spillway back into the pond, just got to work out how to pump into this planted area without it washing everything out of the baskets, thinking I want to be running around 4-5000lph from my skimmer via a tempest but that’s maybe a lot of flow going directly in and through the plants.
stunning pond btw.

The planted area is between 400mm to 450mm deep and holds about 6400 litres of water.
I am running 10,000 l/h to the waterfall via a pod and two 30W uv’s.
If you’re plants are in proper pond baskets with aqua soil and a layer of stones on top they will be fine at any depth.