4. The Soakaway:
Before adding the liner and its underlay I decided to dig a soakaway next to one side of the pond. This was because I had read about ponds overflowing during heavy downpours and storms, then flooding the nearby garden beds or paths. Plus it could mean some of your ‘wildlife’ becoming stranded out in the air eventually, unknown to you, and therefore dying. Although we are not intending to add fish they would or could be lost of course, but we would not like tadpoles and larvae of various invertebrates (dragonflies, mayflies etc) to be washed away into the soil and so on. It was about two patio paving slabs long and one wide with plenty of broken up rubble/bricks dropped into its 40 to 45cm (16 to 18in.) depth. There had to be a narrow-ish channel from the adjacent side of the pond to lead to it with pea-grit or gravel in it for any overflow to run to the soakaway. This channel was only about 25mm (1in.) deep. On the opposite side of the pond I made a similar channel for water to overflow into a section of the garden nearby to become boggy as a future bog-garden. I left the butyl liner uncut there and sloped it down slightly so that the soil on top of it remained soggy for the plants.
To be continued…
Before adding the liner and its underlay I decided to dig a soakaway next to one side of the pond. This was because I had read about ponds overflowing during heavy downpours and storms, then flooding the nearby garden beds or paths. Plus it could mean some of your ‘wildlife’ becoming stranded out in the air eventually, unknown to you, and therefore dying. Although we are not intending to add fish they would or could be lost of course, but we would not like tadpoles and larvae of various invertebrates (dragonflies, mayflies etc) to be washed away into the soil and so on. It was about two patio paving slabs long and one wide with plenty of broken up rubble/bricks dropped into its 40 to 45cm (16 to 18in.) depth. There had to be a narrow-ish channel from the adjacent side of the pond to lead to it with pea-grit or gravel in it for any overflow to run to the soakaway. This channel was only about 25mm (1in.) deep. On the opposite side of the pond I made a similar channel for water to overflow into a section of the garden nearby to become boggy as a future bog-garden. I left the butyl liner uncut there and sloped it down slightly so that the soil on top of it remained soggy for the plants.
To be continued…
 The soakaway was about as wide as a patio slab. |  The soakaway was about 40 to 45cm deep |
The 25mm channel was to the right across the sunken house brick.
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