Pond Habitat Help!

[davedotcom]

Good morning,

I'm looking for some advice and guidance for developing my pond habitat.

In the spring of this year I made a small garden pond - one about 80cmx45cmx45 and another about 60cmx50cmx30cm. However, it never got fully completed. The lining was laid and filled up, but before I could do the trimming of the lining and stone laying, my wife's aunt turned up with a dozen tadpoles. Although I'd said it's best to let frogs come naturally, my comments were ignored.

Thankfully, the tadpoles grew and we have about half a dozen survivors. The pond is adjacent to our veggie patch and we've also had toads visiting! We have a compost bin next to the veggie patch, however it is one of the big plastic ones that sits square on the ground.

My questions is - how best to a) finish the pond and b) develop the habitat?

The frogs seem to use the excess liner so hide/sleep around.

I would like to put a log pile in and have access to deciduous logs but what size is best both in terms of individual log size and overall pile size?

All advice would be greatly appreciated - I would love to encourage more wildlife but want to do it properly!

[davedotcom]

If it helps, here is an embarrassing picture of the pond at present.



There are two varieties or 'wort' oxygenators in there at the moment and also spotted some water snails (no idea where they came from!).

Any advice on what time of year is best to finish the pond and whether to put stone edging or grasses (and what kind) around the pond greatly appreciated.

[King Edward]

It's tricky due to the cramped space. You could perhaps try using natural logs (with bark) to hide the liner at the back and side, while letting grass grow up to the front edges - you'd need a bit more soil especially around the left hand pond.

Bigger logs are generally thought to be better for a woodpile, and a larger pile will have more nooks and crannies for invertebrates, amphibians to live/hide in. Depends how much space/wood you have really.

[davedotcom]

Thanks for your reply King Edward .

Behind from where I was standing to take the photo is the veggie patch which extends for a good ten metres to the rear and a couple of metres to the left. My plan was to put a in log pile running from the pond into the veggie patch - bottom right of the photo.

My brother in law has a number of branches and logs from willow and apple trees he's recently cut down. There are a number of natural park and woodland areas nereby but I understand it's better not to take logs from where they may be 'of use' already.

I'm hoping to have this weekend for getting a lot of it done (assuming it's not a bad time of year to be doing this - don't want to overly disturb the pond residents).

Any advice regarding grasses or plants to go in around the pond?

[King Edward]

Agrostis stolonifera (Creeping Bent) is a good grass to creep over the edge of the liner and down into the water. This is a common garden species you may have growing there already, if not you could transplant some in from nearby. Failing that, just let the ordinary grass grow up a bit, assuming you have grass/lawn up to the pond edge - it might need a light trim now and again (e.g. with shears) to stop it swamping the pond too much.

For the pond itself, I'd avoid floating-leaved plants (Except, maybe, Frogbit) which in this situation would probably shade the water too much. Water Starwort and/or Hornwort would be two good native waterweeds to try.

[N0z]

Get all log sizes put plants in and around the pond (oxygenators marginals and deep water plants) and lets the grass around it seep into the pond and let it grow long which will provide cover for lots of animals (insects, amphibians and maybe some other things) )

[davedotcom]

Thanks for your help with that, much appreciated.

It would appear that the frogs have improvised and are using the hawthorn stump as a home! The past couple of nights we've noticed them coming out of the top (scared the wits out of my wife!) and have previously seen them entering via a hole at the base. I think they will soon outgrow this but at least it may provide somewhere to hibernate over the winter (as well as the bottom of the pond and log pile).

[Billabong Karen]

Looking forward to seeing more photos of the pond as it progresses Dave! Good luck!