Tips and Tricks for Building a Mini Wildlife Pond?

[oksanaetal]

First of all, let’s get this out of the way: I do realize there are other topics like this one, but I have a few specific questions. Of course, other random tips are welcome!

---

I am very seriously considering making a mini (4 ft x 3 ft) wildlife pond next spring, but ran into a few problems.

1. I have heard that pumps can suck dragonfly larvae into them. Is this true? Will plants do the job of filtration instead?
2. I obviously want the water to stay in the pond, but am against the ugly black plastic or any sort of metal container or whatever. Can I use clay as a liner? (Edit: I found this video demonstrating my idea. Of course this is even smaller somehow than my plan.) Or something else?
3. How much of a problem are mosquitoes? Will the dragonflies and dragonfly larvae and frogs and birds and diving beetles eat them up?
4. Will marsh marigold survive in a somewhat sunny and small location?
5. Will waterlilies take over?
6. How easily are diving beetles and pond snails attracted? If I build it, will they come?
7. Only native plants are allowed.

I apologize if I am being too picky. I want this to be as natural as possible.
Thank you!

[pisum]

@oksanaetal

I am very seriously considering making a mini (4 ft x 3 ft) wildlife pond

@oksanaetal

I want this to be as natural as possible.

i think these are antagonistic goals. if you want natural, i think you need a much larger pond. if you want small, then the easiest way to to achieve that is to have an above-ground metal water tank. (i wouldn’t put your tank or hole below ground because i think something that size would just become a hazard.)

[oksanaetal]

I don’t have the space for something much larger.

[pisum]

what are you ultimately trying to achieve? are you trying to provide water for birds and squirrels? are you trying to have a space for dragonfly larvae? are you trying to grow aquatic plants?

you can’t do all of these in this space. so what is your top priority?

[oksanaetal]

I am mostly trying to attract more dragonflies and frogs.

[wildwestnature]

Our experience with making a small, in-ground, homemade pond was that multiple small solar pumps were not sufficient to keep it from becoming a thick, green stew by sometime in June (in a four-season climate). We have read that one needs about 80% shade to prevent this. Or maybe a more robust pump.

We started small, like you’re considering, and more than doubled the size over intervening years.

One year we had a drought and decided not to fill the pond with supplemental water. Possibly because of years of leaves and other organic matter decaying, the pond transformed into a marsh and now features willows, bulrushes, beggarticks. And that is with a black poly liner under it.

We never noticed more mosquitoes than any other backyard in our suburban neighborhood, and we have noticed many more dragonflies (meadowlarks, forktails, darners, skimmers). We also have some prairie plants and don’t mow much.

[teellbee]

Years back, I moved into a place with an small 5x3x4 ft goldfish pond. It was planted with horsetail , water hyacinth, water lilies, etc. and had various algae growing in it. It was not natural, but it supported dragonflies and many small water organisms in addition to several large (2- to 8-inch) goldfish. In fact, over time, the fish stopped eating the commercial fish food and just foraged for whatever it was they liked.

It had a biological filter (which provided ~awesome~ fertilizer when cleaned it) and a waterfall for aeration. The waterfall kind of broke after some years, so I added some large aquarium bubblers for better oxygenation.

It had a black liner which did not show at all as there was a rim of rocks and lots of edge plantings.

[charlie]

had to pop back in for this one.

-please do not build any form of pond in an already intact habitat such as a wetland, on a stream, etc. This can be really harmful and cause net decline in ecological condition, and in some places is even illegal.

consider a bog bin instead/first. Or a rain garden,

Ponds are popular and a natural pond is a wonderful thing. In most parts of the world, an artificial pond is usually an algae filled mess, a unneeded use of precious water, and/or a huge management expense. Standing water is difficult to manage in a backyard setting, algae that people don’t like usually forms unless you poison the pond, and mosquitos are a constant issue in many cases. You need to put Bt pellets in when you see them, or drain it. And they come in fast.

Full disclosure, i have a bunch of bog bins and am also experimenting with one that is meant to hold water some of the time like a sort of vernal pool. Thus far either it’s leaking or the water is just wicking out, and it’s not really holding water at all despite the wet climate here.

I’m a wetland ecologist and i can’t even count as many times i’ve seen ‘wildlife’ ponds put in wetlands that end up destroying the wetland and creating a really generic algae pit instead.

As others have said, a bird bath type feature may provide water for animals if that is your goal. if you already have an artificial pond, it probably wants to be a wetland if it has a consistent source of water. Do like @wildwestnature and let it do its thing as a little seasonal marsh. Or, try to nudge a constructed pond to a peatland. In Vermont, USA, small natural kettle holes turned into wonderful bogs over time and it may be possible to do similar (or form an intermediate or rich fen or at least a cattail marsh) in a backyard pond, depending on water chemistry, water level, etc. if it stays wet all the time it will sequester a bunch of carbon, reducing the impacts of climate change a little tiny bit. Win-win!

[oksanaetal]

@charlie

-please do not build any form of pond in an already intact habitat such as a wetland, on a stream, etc. This can be really harmful and cause net decline in ecological condition, and in some places is even illegal.

Don’t worry, I’m making this in place of some invasive ferns.

[charlie]

sounds like a definite improvement!

[giannamaria]

Hi! I will try to answer your questions as best I can, as I have kept natural aquariums and vivariums before.

@oksanaetal

I have heard that pumps can suck dragonfly larvae into them. Is this true? Will plants do the job of filtration instead?

I don’t think a pump needed for a pond of this size will do this. Many aquarists with a tank of the same size like to keep various inverts in their tanks alongside fish, to act as a ‘clean-up crew’: Things like different shrimp species are popular. For a tank of this size, pumps don’t pose a problem for little creatures like this. So, to summarize, I don’t think a pump would harm dragonfly larvae. I’m going to jump to question three not because it is related:

@oksanaetal

How much of a problem are mosquitoes? Will the dragonflies and dragonfly larvae and frogs and birds and diving beetles eat them up?

Mosquitos will be a bigger problem without a pump. They hate laying eggs in running water, so they go for still water, which is one of the reasons I recommend a pump. You don’t need to have the water going so fast that it makes trouble for other inverts, but when there is moving water mosquitos are less likely to lay eggs there.

@oksanaetal

I obviously want the water to stay in the pond, but am against the ugly black plastic or any sort of metal container or whatever. Can I use clay as a liner? Or something else?

I am not sure if clay would work. You may have to use the lining, especially since the pond is so small. There is a way to make the lining invisible: a great youtuber I like is SerpaDesign. Here’s a link for one of his ponds: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P3d7DeNmiko

@oksanaetal

Will marsh marigold survive in a somewhat sunny and small location?

In my experience with seeing marsh marigold at my natural pond, I would say that it needs at least partial shade, but I haven’t tried intentionally growing it. If you could provide partial shade, my guess would be yes, but I’m not 100% sure.

@oksanaetal

Will waterlilies take over?

I haven’t worked much with this plant, either, but from what I know they do like to spread. I doubt it would be hard to control the amount of waterlilies though, but again, I’d look into it more.

@oksanaetal

Only native plants are allowed.

Good! Some other native plants I know of for a sunny pond are milkweed and Joe Pye weed, (If you live in the US, at least)

And don’t apologize for being picky, this is your pond!
Hope my tips help.

Gianna

[oksanaetal]

Thank you for all that! Part of the reason I don’t want a pump is because I want it 100% natural.

@giannamaria

There is a way to make the lining invisible

I think I have seen the video, thanks! Again, I want to not use plastic and keep it natural.

@giannamaria

milkweed and Joe Pye weed

Already in the yard!

@giannamaria

If you could provide partial shade

I’ll try, thanks! Will irises and/or cattail work as shade-making plants?

[giannamaria]

If you aren’t using a pump, then plants should work fine with a pond of this size. And with it attracting frogs and dragonflies, I wouldn’t worry about mosquitoes either.

Keeping the water in the pond, and keeping it from just going into the ground might be a bit tricky. How natural do you want it? Would lining it with concrete somehow work? The only reason I ask is that I’m worried about the durability and longevity of clay.

Lastly, I’m not sure about irises, I would say it depends on the size of the plant, but I think cattails are part of the reason marsh marigolds grow at my pond. They can get pretty tall and help shade a sunny place. Having some small native shrub, like an elderberry, might help too if the cattails aren’t enough.

[jasonhernandez74]

@pisum

i think these are antagonistic goals. if you want natural, i think you need a much larger pond

I will agree with this. What is the smallest natural pond you have ever seen that isn’t just a puddle? Different natural processes work on different scales; under a given rainfall regimen, puddle dynamics, vernal pool dynamics, and pond dynamics each happen because of the size of the respective depressions.

You didn’t say how deep you intend this to be, but in natural topography, 4 ft x 3 ft is puddle size unless it is a pool connected to a stream.

With that said, organisms aren’t necessarily fussy about “natural.” I have seen neglected swimming pools full of tadpoles and aquatic insects. My master’s thesis was based on experiments with tadpoles conducted in cattle watering tanks, and my labmates used the same kind of tanks for their studies on dragonflies and insect biodiversity.

[oksanaetal]

@giannamaria

lining it with concrete

Maybe. I don’t really have access to concrete.

[oksanaetal]

Would 6 x 5 x 1.5 ft work?

Also…

@jasonhernandez74

organisms aren’t necessarily fussy about “natural.

I am!

[pisum]

@jasonhernandez74

cattle watering tanks

for a water feature this small, a metal or plastic stock tank is what i would use as a starting point. a black plastic 100-ish gallon stock tank partially buried and surrounded by stones would have a “natural” look, and rigid plastic is going to look nicer than some sort of black membrane.

[oksanaetal]

For me, the biggest point of a no-liner pond is that I don’t want to keep the plants in pots or in soil added at the bottom of the container/liner, and also so I can add a deeper area.

[teellbee]

@oksanaetal

Would 6 x 5 x 1.5 ft work?

In my experience with my small pond, when the water level fell ~below~ 2 1/2 to 3 feet deep (due to a leak) there were problems.

It was not deep enough for the pond critters to dive down to escape assorted predators (egrets, raccoons, etc.)

The algae tended to overgrow the pond when it was shallower. I used a type of non-toxic straw you can buy from pond suppliers and it worked well to clear the water. But, I really tried to keep the water level up to at least 3.5 to 4 feet.

FWIW, i rarely had a problem with mosquito larvae when I kept the water moving and had fish in it. Here, we can get mosquito eater fish from the county to keep down mosquito larvae in ponds) or from pond suppliers. You may want to find a source for a little native fish to keep your pond free of mosquito larvae.

If you don’t want a pump (tricky challenge for you), find another way to agitate the water both to keep down mosquitos and algae and provide more oxygen for the pond critters. Perhaps several water wigglers would move the water enough? Water Wigglers, solar or battery . Also, some large aquarium bubblers might do a good enough job, depending on your climate and the evolving conditions of the pond. A pond guy said I could aerate and agitate my little pond mechanically several times every day, but what a lot of work that would have been.

Anyway, unless you have a inlet and outlet for water creating a current, I’m pretty sure you will need to find a way to circulate the water and keep it from getting stagnant.

My pond was in a small fenced patio, so it was not connected to any wild water ways. It was highly satisfying, but eventually it got to be too much for me to keep up and I replaced it with a lemon tree.

I loved the wild life my pond attracted, including many dragonflies, damsel flies, birds, water creatures. As i mentioned, I did not even need to feed the fish after a time because they could find whatever they wanted to eat growing in the pond.

[oksanaetal]

Thank you! I can try to deepen the pond once I make it. The water wigglers sound good. I have made an agreement with my family to not add fish because they tried to make a pond with fish and it was a hassle.