Tim,

look at my pond, the far side is higher so we just piled the rocks higher and it looks nice that way. the near side is at least a foot and a half lower but all our shelves and beach are level.. oops I guess it isn;t as noticeable in the picture..

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Tim,

How much higher is the high side than the low side?

Nice pond, Mybusy! Really attractive. That probably answers the question.

The down side is probably 2' lower. There is a top pond spilling into a lower pond also so a retaining wall to even up the sides totally would require a wall about 4' tall. I didn't think a retaining wall would give it as natural a look as staying with the slopre and working with it.

thanks,

tim

My only suggestion would be building your plant shelves as wide as possible on the high side of the pond. That way you have room to put down some larger boulders as well as smaller rocks that will help make the transition up the slope a little more natural looking. It about killed us, getting even small boulders down onto our shelves, but now I wish we had added more and made them bigger-- the places where there are smaller rocks only doesn't look as natural to me.

Just now read your post on making shelves. We did make a plant shelf on the low end of our pond with concrete blocks and put extra liner scraps over the edges before laying the liner over that. However, my husband, like morningstroll, is still worried about the edges and won't let me put anything heavier than water lilies on the shelf. :-)
Sherry
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Sherry, I love it! I want it.

I was going to say the same thing about widening the plant shelves, since 2 feet seems pretty high to stack rocks, I guess depending on how big they are. The walls should lean out a little so the rocks can stack and be stable, like they do retaining walls.

I think you have the right idea. Let it follow that natural slope. I bet it will be beautiful.

Thanks for the help! Tim.

Cover the blocks with old carpet before putting in the liner to cushion the edges of the block.

OOOOOOOOh Sherry I like that.. you can have lots of fish in one that big.. I have pond envy

I am re-doing my 2000 gal pond which has a skimmer,bottom drain and bio /water fall unit with one 1/4 hp pump .I will increase the pond to 5000 gal.For this redo,how would you compare a new ultima filter add-on with a single 1/2 hp pump to an alternate approach using my present 1/4 hp pump dedicated to skimming and another new 1/4 hp pump dedicated to bottom drain , both pump outputs going to the waterfall unit.