Water brings another dimension to your garden, if you don’t have any form of water feature you are missing out! As well as adding interest, water brings a multitude of wildlife into your garden like newts, frogs, toads, birds, hedgehogs, and many insects – to name a few. The sound of running water will mask any unwanted noise such as a busy road, creating a relaxing atmosphere and having a cooling effect on a hot day.
In my garden I have three different types of water feature, a wildlife pond, a wall fountain and a bubbling millstone feature. I will cover each feature individually as they are very different.
If you would like to see my water features in a video I have a garden tour IGTV on my instagram account, where you can see and hear how they fit into my garden.
The Wildlife Pond
My pond just after installation
The first water feature I chose to add was a wildlife pond. A wildlife pond does not include fish; the fish eat the wildlife! I designed the pond to look as if there is a spring trickling into it from behind my beautiful redwood tree, through a gently sloping waterfall, this is achieved by using a self circulating pump.
I decided to situate the pond against the wall and had a landscaping company come and dig out the pond area, lay the pond liner and build the waterfall and retaining back wall of the pond from local stone. The electrics were installed first by an electrician. The double socket is visible in the second photo (fixed to the wall), this is now hidden by plants and the wire for the pump runs behind into the pond. I used an old sleeper at the front and different sized pebbles to hide the pond liner and create a more natural effect.
I wanted a shallow ‘beach’ area so that if a hedgehog etc. fell into the pond they could easily escape, it also makes an excellent bird bath. The pond is very deep directly where the water enters from the waterfall, around 4ft. It is important to have different depths to suit different plants and animals and for the balance of the pond. There is a shelf about a foot deep at the back of the pond to stand pond plants on. Visit a great ‘how to create a wildlife pond’ guide from Gardeners World HERE
Once the structure of the pond was complete I added plants. The most important are the oxygenating plants which are submerged but as the name suggests will oxygenate the water – I then added more decorative ones. There are no Water Lilies as the surface of the water needs to be still for them to thrive and mine is moving due to the waterfall. Lastly I planted up around the pond and as you can see this filled out to create a lush environment that I am very pleased with.
With any pond there is ongoing maintenance. During the summer the pond has to be topped up with water from my water butt (using tap water will damage the balance of the pond). Leaves must be cleared during autumn and we usually put a net up over the pond to catch most of them before they become an issue. The pump also has to be cleared a couple of times a year as it becomes clogged with mud and sediment. I leave the pump on 24/7, which uses quite a bit of electricity, but I have had no problems generally and the pond is able to become home to newts, toads, frogs and many larvae. The bird population has definitely risen with many more birds nesting in the garden now. We see dragonfly and mayfly, bees drink from the pond and we have visiting hedgehogs.
The Wall Fountain
The wall fountain in August
I had a flower bed at the top of the garden which used to have a long box hedge running along the length of it. I removed the hedge but wanted to keep the more formal feel while adding a feature to break up the long expanse of wall. I chose the Bayeux Wall Fountain from Haddonstone.
This wall fountain is self circulating so does not need a water supply, only a socket within 10 meters, however, it does need to be perfectly straight and flat. My very old garden walls are not straight so I had to have a pillar built in brick and a concrete base for the fountain to be fixed to. I used reclaimed bricks from Watling Street Reclamation in Towcester.
I had to remove the small plum tree and some of the lager plants. The fountain was easy to construct and once it was in place and working I decided to add a path in front using the leftover reclaimed bricks. You can find an instagram highlight on how I built this HERE
Once the path and fountain were finished I could think about planting. In the Spring this bed is full of alliums, closely followed by Foxgloves, infilled with geraniums and creeping thyme to soften the path. In late summer there are Dahlias which last well into autumn. I also have box balls which add structure and pots on top of the brick pillar which are changed through the season.
This type of fountain needs to be topped up (tap water is fine) every other day through the summer. I have it on a timer and it runs from 11am through to around 9pm in the summer months only. It is also quite a loud fountain, which is fine in my garden as it’s quite a way from the house, I would recommend visiting a showroom and listening to the individual fountains to make sure you don’t end up with one that sounds like an emptying drain! Haddonstone have a wonderful show garden here in Northamptonshire which is worth a visit where you can see an example of nearly all their fountains, statues and architectural features.
The Bubbling Millstone
My most recent addition is the millstone (grindstone) which is next to our patio. This is a quieter feature and is only used occasionally in the summer.
My husband and I put this together ourselves, it took about 3 days. I documented the process on THIS instagram highlight. The first step is to dig a large hole for the reservoir making sure it is flush and level.
Once this is was in place, I added the galvanised steel grid, I have linked the one I used HERE (affiliate link to Amazon). Amazon also sell pumps, tubing and pond liners.
As we were covering the the gird with fine gravel I added some finer mesh to stop the gravel falling through into the reservoir.
The grindstone came from Watling Street Reclamation, they have a fabulous selection all different sizes. They are very heavy which is why the reinforced grid is required. As with any water feature it is very important that it is level, even a couple of millimetres makes a huge difference, this was the most difficult part.
We already had an electricity supply near by and the next step was to put in the pump and feed a tube up into the centre of the grindstone hole.
We used a section of hose pipe inside some insulation tubing. Once it was level and working we put the gravel back. It makes a lovely feature next to the patio and has a calm cooling effect on a hot day.
This type of water feature needs topping up regularly as the water evaporates and splashes out especially in hot weather. We only use this occasionally so the water does stagnate and it can smell when first turned on. I like to add a cap full off bleach to the water which fixes the smell but may shorten the pump life.
Points to Remember
- Do not install a water feature if you have young children, they can drown in a few centimetres of water.
- All electrics must be installed by a qualified electrician.
- Water features do require maintenance so are not hassle free, but worth it I think!