Show me your garden ponds large and small please!

[susandelgado]

I'm trying to decide what to do, I bought a fibreglass pond but now I think it's too big, help me make my mind up 😊

@StealthSnail thank you. It's been such a long and difficult week I could have cried! I did use Puddle plants in the end and they were so helpful. I would recommend them too.

Glad you had a good experience with them too Polka. Fingers crossed everything settles and in no time you'll be enjoying all sorts in your pond.

Every time you do anything with a pond, you stir up mud. You soon get used to it. It settles every time.

Thank you @MereDintofPandiculation I was more worried because I'm using a Belfast sink so it went from nice and clean to murky immediately. Looks fine this morning but with hindsight I wish I'd put light coloured stones at the bottom!

I have a pond which is the joy of my life (I was on the other thread as Secondaryburnzz). We pinched a scoop of water from a local wildlife pond and have a rich variety of life forms have started appearing. (the furry one in the picture was ours already).
We have a huge frog who just showed up the other day, and a home grown froglet, plus some tadpoles, a newt, some ghostly snails and some semaphore flies. I am a little worried about whether our little pond can actually support so many critters. Should I still scoop out the blanket weed strands or will some of the above eat it? Sheesh it's a responsibility having all these tiny mouths to eat

PS love your trough @BrassicaBabe

Your pond will be fine. The frog will spend most of its adult life out of te water, and so will the newt, although it spends more time in water than the frog does.

I would still remove the blanket weed. Nothing eats it as fast as it grows, but make sure you leave it at the edge of the pond so creatures can escape, and it might be worth inspecting for newt larvae - they look like baby fish with legs.

Well I found two decapitated frogs on the lawn which I think was our visiting cat. He also had a blummin pigeon but that's another story

This morning I was clearing an area that had logs in it and out popped 5 frogs

I've relocated them to the not pond and put sine logs over there

I assume that I shouldn't use slug pellets in the garden now just in case any of my aquatic children eat a poisoned slug body?

That must have been a grisly shock Oldraver I hope my cat doesn't eat my frogs. You did well to move them though, the one I saw the other day was leaping all over the place, so I thought I would let him do his own thing. At least we have lots of rain to keep them all nice and damp.
I'm still looking for a decent mat forming plant to cover the bare soil near my pond. The soil is compost, and keeps getting dug up by local squirrels. I want a plant to cover up the soil so they go and bury their nuts somewhere else. Can you think of anything? The other plants are ferns and some massive nastursiums, and I have some old logs forming a bit of a woodland feel. So something green and moss-like but with some kind of benefit to bees/insects. I wondered about Soleirolia Soleirolii but not sure if there is something better.
Thanks in advance!

Hi, I'm new to this this thread and was wondering if any of you lovely mumsnetters could tell me what these are in my miniature pond please?

They are mosquito larvae @ popgoesperfection 😊

I've got these in my mini pond too!

Thankyou @IDidntChoseThePondLife

Is that a good or a bad thing? I was really hoping for some tadpoles !

Mine is work in progress. First photo is how it was when we moved in. Second how it is now. I can't get the pump to work but stepdad is going to fix it he says.

Then I need to get some plants etc. I know someone who wants rid of 2 goldfish so I was planning on putting them in there.

At the moment the dogs just treat it like a giant water bowl

Well the ungrateful little frogged have disappeared. My neighbour has a mega pond in his front garden so assume that's where my log frogs were from

I was really hoping for some tadpoles ! Did you have frogspawn?

Your pond looks lovely and clear, but mosquito larvae turn into mosquitoes. Once your pond has acquired its wildlife (eg damsel fly larvae) you'll not see any more mozzie larvae.

I can't think of anything better than Soleriola soleriollii for cover soil in damp shade, but it won't deter the squirrels - bear in mind they bury nuts in the thick grass sward of a lawn.

Thank you as ever Meredint I will get some Soleriola soleriollii and hope that the squirrels might be slightly deterred. I have so many peanut seedlings springing up everywhere it's quite comical! I admire them really, but just don't want them to be flinging loads of soil into the pond!
Thanks again, and happy ponding everyone!

Mere I'm not sure 🤔 the pond is a new ish addition to the garden so am expecting to have to wait a while for wildlife to be attracted. I'm struggling to get a hold of some plants to add to the pond too which I know will help attract the wildlife.

@59popgoesperfection I got my plants through puddle plants online and they were really good.

Since I realised that the wiggles in my pond are mosquito larvae I'm not peering in so much - praying for other wildlife to turn up and eat them!

Thanks @Polkadotdelight I'll have a look on there! I only need a couple as it's a teeny tiny pond.

We dug ours the first weekend of lockdown. We have several frogs, unfortunately almost every night at midnight dcat brings one in and proudly deposits it on my bedroom floor and I have to trek out to the garden to return it. Its no mean feat for her to bring it in either she has to catch, jump over a 7 ft wall, on to a 4 foot fence up on to the porch, up onto the windowsill and in my bedroom. She's understandably miffed when I reject her gift.

We had loads of mosquito larvae but they haven't been a problem as the frogs must have eaten them. It was amazing how quickly wildlife colonised the pond. It was mosquito larvae and blood worms first, then our first frog. Then diving beetles and now we have loads of water snails too which must have come in on a plant.

Algae wise the pond went pea green after a week or so, I added some water clear chemicals and barley straw and its been clear ever since. Blanket weed has just started to develop but DD likes to wind it on a stick to get it out.

@Chesneyhawkes1 you don't need a pump if you have a wildlife pond, only if you have fish. If you do get fish then it's unlikely you'll get tadpoles etc as they eat them so you'll need to consider what pond type you want.

I bought a medium wildlife pond plant collection from Wetland plants which were brilliant. They do smaller versions too, you just need to add aquatic soil and pebbles as they come with pots or they sell individual plants.

DH isn't convinced we will get any frogs because he says we are too far from any water but I have seen newts in my compost bin before now so I'm hopeful we will get something interesting!

I have puddle plants the dimensions of the sink I was using and the instruction that I wanted a wildlife pond and they came back with recommendations of which plants would give me the longest flowering times, attract wildlife etc.

@Polkadotdelight I have lived in my house for 10 years and never, ever seen a frog. A week after filling the pond up I found one literally on my front door step. No idea how he got there but my garden is surrounded by a 7 ft brick wall on all sides with a big gate that it wouldn't be able to fit under, it's as if he knew and wanted to move into his new digs. I've no idea where the other 2 came from either but the first one was such a surprise, literally opened the front door and nearly stepped on it.

@20HPandTheNeverEndingBedtime that gives me hope!! I had some frog visitors in our last house but there was a stream/culvert at the end of the garden.