[edstrong]

Thanks for the comments!

Don't give up on the small ponds: every bit counts, and small wildlife-friendly gardens can act as stepping stones, linking them all together to the wider natural world. Will check out the bee-friendly thread.

[skeeterm5]

@edstrong your posts are amazing and very inspiring. Thank you.

[Kiran]

We dug a small natural pond for our duck, as the soil was clay I had assumed it would be ok and not need a liner. The first year the water level changed dramatically with the seasons and we were considering puddling it, stuff for in the way as it always does, any after years 2 and 3 the level stays pretty constant. I put in a spill way pipe so the overflow runs into our drainage ditch in heavy rain but there is only minimal level drops in the summer now. Nature found the way!

The only think I would say is our water never looks really clean, no doubt this is partly the ducks, but also the clay side. This year I will look at some plants to clean it up a bit and if that doesnt work a circulation pump maybe.

Good luck with your pond

[skeeterm5]

Thanks all.

We dug some test holes and the water drains away relatively quickly so I am going to go down the liner route. We have pegged out the area to make sure it is the size we want and also worked out what trees we want to plant in the area too.

Work to start shortly, I will update as we go.

[doganjo]

Thanks all.

We dug some test holes and the water drains away relatively quickly so I am going to go down the liner route. We have pegged out the area to make sure it is the size we want and also worked out what trees we want to plant in the area too.

Work to start shortly, I will update as we go.

@skeeterm5 With photos?
I set up a website when I built my house in 2005, but took it down when I moved.  Loads of photos.  Wish I'd just renewed the domain name fee now as I had a scare last week when my pup pressed a button on my laptop and I thought he had deleted all my photos. 
After numerous unsuccessful attempts to recover them from the cloud and in despair, I suddenly discovered he must have pressed return when I was moving something and there they were on my desktop.  Unfortunately no narrative but I'm going to try to reinstate the website

The moral is 'don't rely entirely on the cloud!' and 'tie the pup to a ball and chain when working on the laptop' 

[skeeterm5]

I will try to do a blog of sorts to show progress and then people can marvel at my skills (or lack thereof). A new thread to start in due course.

[edstrong]

I will try to do a blog of sorts to show progress and then people can marvel at my skills (or lack thereof). A new thread to start in due course.

Please do: it would be great to see how it turns out.