Unwanted pond removal

[Lavendar01]

We are considering putting offer on a house that has two ponds in the garden (with pump filter etc) about 1 metre wide all round

Struggling to get someone to give quote would appreciate if anyone has an idea how much this job can cost - are we looking out hundreds or thousands?

Ta!

Surely this is a cheap DIY job?

You could probably post about the pond on Facebook and people will come and take away the plants and hopefully any wildlife and rehome them. Ditto filters, stones etc. You can probably get free soil from Facebook to back fill the pond.

Be aware that depending on how quickly the house sale goes through, pond maintenance and removal should be done in the autumn, by the spring critters are returning.

It won't take long to empty by hand just get some long pond gloves a bucket but s PP recommended advertise on FB or similar so people can collect plants and wildlife.

Is keeping the pond not an option, change it into a wildlife pond will require minimum upkeep although fish won't live in it and you can get a metal grid over it for safety.

DIY job absolutely if you have the time. Probably 2 or 3 days labour for someone otherwise? Rehome fish, empty water using buckets, cut them membrane for the last bits you can't get into bucket, pull out the membrane, smash up any border rocks and throw back into the pond holes, cover with soil then top with grass seeds or whatever your preferred option is on top.

cost me about £500 to get a 2.5x1.5m pond filled in and slabbed over
I did all the electrical gubbins removal beforehand

We did it ourselves, was a bit of hard work but notdifficult. We filled in the space quite easily. We used buckets to get rid of the water but a reverse pump might do it.

Thanks everyone, very helpful advice!

We'd like to remove ponds and redo the garden and replace with grass it so it's down to very simple grass and patio, as theres alot going on atm (I imagine very pretty when maintained regularly, but we just aren't gardening people)

Would fish still be alive if the house has been vacant for 2months and the water pump filter etc has been off all this time? We did spot a toads jumping around

Are they Koy Carp, fairly fragile and expensive, need clean water and looking after or Goldfish or something more unusual? Our Goldfish type fish survive pretty well in our rather neglected (reasonably large deep) pond plenty for them to eat and they breed in there, but we do feed more in the summer (our pump died a while ago and they seem fine without, another job to do). They 'hibernate' in the bottom of the pond when it gets cold. You need to find out what are in there to decide what their chances of survival are or what care they may need..

You can request that the owners remove the fish as part of the property fixtures and fitting form. They are technically their fish and should only leave them if you agree to this. Whether they do this is another thing. We requested this and unfortunately the lazy owners didn't take them and we didn't realise until we went to remove the pond as we didn't check when we moved in (presuming it was an empty pond) thankfully the fish were okay as it had been winter so they had been hibernating and as soon as warm weather hit we were going to do the pond!

If there are fish in there you can simply advertise on Facebook or similar for someone to take them for free. Predators regularly make off with pond fish so you could also leave uncovered and see what's left by the spring.
Toads etc will eventually find new homes but depends on what time of year you move in. Dead of winter they'll be hibernating, spring they'll be spawning but I'm not sure when's a good time for a wildlife pond.
Re cost - depends if it's a liner with some paving slabs keeping it all in place or a full professional job with walls, carbon fibre shell etc etc? A metre wide sounds like the more basic hobby type so minimal I would think?
Electricals - half day charge from an electrician to remove it all and make safe. Might be handy yo see where the feed comes from and replace with a safe outside plug socket.