Wildlife Pond
 

Hi, I am in the process of tying to make my garden more inviting for wildlife. Which really involves not over "beautifying, concreting or decking, but is a bit more of a "natural" approach to the garden. This includes a pond - not an ornamental pond, a murky muddy wildlife pond and have done some research and lots of reading and am going to dig it this Saturday, and am in the process of trying to locate all the stuff needed like pond liner ect. One of the suggestions is to go along and collect a bottle of water from a proper establish ancient wildlife pond in your area. Does anyone know where there would be one in Wicklow area. It has to be an unintefered with non-fish pond apparently according to the wildlife people on the site I was reading.
Has anyone created this kind of non-ornamental natrual wildlife pond before?
Thanks.

pond
 

Morning

yep a good idea to set up with other pond water but dont worry to much, use rainwater if you have a water butt, use that collected rain.
wildlife will inhabit any water once its been left for a while, I have built a similar pond, dont drive yourself mad,
plants into pond are important and encourage wildlife also make sure you have a slope area from the water upwards to enable say a hedgehog or similar to drink and not drown or if they fall in they can get to shore! also some stones in pond for creatures to hide or evena couple of flower pots laid down with some aquatic soil laid into them for insects and beings to hide in.


good luck and hope it all goes well the hard work will be worth it......

pond
 

Hi its me again just reading "BLAGDON" guide due to the fact I have duckweed which i used this chemical for but they have a guide and reading that you can use a Blagdon Bio-Activator to set it up
and the following
plants i lily per 1.4m2 or 15ft of water surface area these provide good top cover for the water in the summer
1 marginal plant approx same measurements 1 bunch ogygenators e.g. curly pond weed for every 2ft of water surface area weighted down.
and most important to stop blanket weed use Barley Straw bundles or barley straw extract Blanket week suffocates the pond so you dont need it if all else fails you can remove it by a long stick being twisted around winding it up to dispose of it then throw it in the compost
sounds so compolicated but its not and once set up its great to watch the water boatmen and creatures around it...enjoy

hi
 

hi Sue, thanks for the information. Very useful. I am looking forward to it now. Have to work out now if I have to fence it off from the hens! Not sure if they can swim!

pond
 

dont worry about them, I used to have chooks and they dont like going in, so dont bother getting to close, they are quiet clever and grab the grubs and not paddling to much......