How to Make a Garden Pond

Imagine yourself having dinner outside on a warm summer evening, listening to the peaceful sounds of falling water over river rocks. Unfortunately, not many of us live near a natural pond or stream. However, there are easy ways to create your own garden pond complete with a waterfall or fountain. Adding a water feature to your garden or patio is actually much easier than you'd think. All you need is a little patch of land, some water, and a few supplies and you're on your way to complete Zen...

Supplies:
*Shovel
*Pond pump with filter
*Tubing
*A few bags of sand
*Various rocks
*Pond liner

Instructions:
Designate the place where you want your pond to be located and draw a rough outline with your shovel. Next, dig a hole into the ground at least two feet that will be filled with water. This is the part that will be the most time consuming.

Once you have your hole, fill it with your purchased sand to create a nice cushion layer over which your pond liner will sit. We have rock hard Virginia clay here, so I used some old foam scraps left over from another project along with the sand.

Gently open out your pond liner and completely cover your hole. Using scissors, cut off any of the excess liner. The beauty of using pond liner over a pre-formed hard liner is you can be creative in designing your own shape. I liked the Azalea bush in my backyard so much that I decided to create my pond around it. When the bush blooms, it is absolutely stunning.

Lay some heavy stones over the liner to hold it down. You can get creative and build your own wall by stacking your stones as shown.

Assemble your pond pump according to the instructions and place in the deepest part of your pond.

Next comes the fun part. Throw in a garden hose and turn on the water. In a few hours, your pond will be full and you can plug in your pump.

That's it!