# Waterless Pods



## Brendan (Jan 12, 2008)

I'm building a new water feature. Being a lazy type, I really hate cleaning ponds and I have a tree nearby that looses it's leaves during Winter making a really mess. Maybe a waterless pond could be the answer. Can someone help me with he details of how to go about building one?


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## Mike Reilley (Jan 2, 2008)

I built a set of waterfalls along a river that cascade into a "waterless pond". In my case, my waterless pond is a 4'x4'x4 or so size hole (the sump) dug in the ground at the foot of the last waterfall. That hole is lined with padding that is covered with an EPDM liner. That liner goes all the way from the waterless pond sump...up the river...to the highest point, creating one single EPDM sealed surface. 

After lining the sump with EPDM, the next step is to place a barrel inside the sump into which you place the pump for the water feature. Small holes are cut into the barrel to allow water into it. I just drilled 3/4" holes all over the barrel...which was a sump pump enclosure I bought at Home Depot. That thing is designed to be put into the basement of a house and concreted in...and into which you place the sump pump. It's sold in the plumbing department. Sump barrel


You need to cut one larger hole to allow the pump output tube out of the barrel...and you run that to the top of the water feature. You cut a second hole to run the plug for the pump out of the hole to a GFI controlled power source.

Once you have the barrel inside the sump...with the hose going to the top of the water feature in place...and the power cord out...you fill the sump with CLEANED 2" gravel. That job is a bitch...because you need to take the 2" gravel, wheelbarrow by wheelbarrow load...and wash it till no sand or small particles are in it. CLEAN means JUST ROCK...no sand...no dust. Then you fill the sump and bury the barrel with this CLEAN rock.

As you come up to the final level of rock, you can switch to rock that is more appropriate for a stream...rounder stuff...to cover the sump and larger rounder stuff to go around the edge.









Here's the hole I dug.










Now with the barrel inside the EPDM....and you can see the overflow drain pipe I fitted around it so it drains rain water before water rises above the final rock level.










The not so fun job...of cleaning the gravel...and a LOT of sand/fines come out of supposedly clean rock.









The rock is now up to the top of the barrel...and I began building UP for the last waterfall. The white hose is the pump output that is run under the EPDM.









All done.... 


To run the system, you fill the sump till the water is a few inches below the top layer of rock...maybe six inches. When you turn the pump on, it will drain that level down as it fills the upper water feature. If your water feature is LARGE, you might want to dig a larger sump. You don't want the pump to ever be starved of water...but you don't want to have standing water above the rock if you're trying to have a "waterless pond".


I also learned that water evaporation is an issue you need to deal with. In my case, I'll bet half the water in the sump will evaporate after about 6 hours of operation....because all the rock in the dry river bed and the waterfalls gets hot in the sun...and the water cools it...and evaporates. I am going to back-fit a pool filler into the sump so that the water level stays constant in the sump.


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## Mike Reilley (Jan 2, 2008)

Oh...and one more thing...you'll still need to clean your water feature. But the good news is that if you put some 1/4" screening over the end of a shop vac hose...you can just blow off and vacuum up the river bed and the top of the sump...AFTER the river has been allowed to dry for a week of so. I too have trees above the water feature that little blossoms and seeds fall from. After blowing the leaves off the rocks...I then vacuum the little stuff up. I've also put a layer of window screen on the sump...so that nothing gets DOWN into it. That screen is buried in the top layer of the rock...so you don't want to walk on that rock, because you destroy the screening.


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## toddalin (Jan 4, 2008)

I built my "waterless pond" as a regular pond out of textured concrete coated with waterproofing paint then color. I just leave it dry when not in use. A float switch brings on a pump to evaculate it twice a day when the sprinklers come on. A little piece of chlorine keeps the half gallon or so of water that remains around the pump from going stagnent.

When I want to use it, I fill it though a dedicated fitting and valve.


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## NTCGRR (Jan 2, 2008)

Cleaning??? I like the look of a natural "looking" pond. thus I use a net to clean the leaves. 
Like Mike said,evatoration is great different times of the year here. this rainy season I don't try to make the pond be "clear" yet in drier times its clear yet I have to top it off once a week. 
I can't type all i want to say, but for me ponds ,and you having a reasonable stand is very easy to do. 
takes me about 10 mins every other week to rinse the two types of filers . 
I buy nothing for the water. 

can't find photo of the new pond???

never loaded them up, this is from 09


















The only reason I share this with you is, "clean" can be over rated.

I will get updated photos later.
I did not check for green cards ...LOL


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## Brendan (Jan 12, 2008)

Thanks everyone . I think I know what I'm going to do now.


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## PLONIEN (Jul 31, 2008)

One word of caution from my experience, if you utilize a plastic/rubber type of garbage can for the sump which seems to be a good choice since it does not rust and holds water, be aware that when you bury the container in the ground, after time, the ground around the sump will swell, thus crushing in the sides of the barrel. You end up having to dig out the entire sump area and try again. The second time, instead of using sand and gravel as the filler around the barrel, I dug the hole oversized and put concrete reinforcement wire around the outside of the barrel and then filed the area with sack concrete. It kind of makes it like a septic tank construction and has prevented the “crushing” done by the surrounding ground area. Just friendly advice from one who did not consider the crushing ability of the earth around a hole in the ground. Reagrds, 

Jack 

[url="


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## Trains (Jan 2, 2008)

Jack,

Would you have any more photos of your layout you could share?

Don


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## Brendan (Jan 12, 2008)

Thanks Jack


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## Treeman (Jan 6, 2008)

We call them a pond less water fall. They are much less matinence than a standing pond. And can be turned off at any time, this will save energy. The standard way of building is much the same as a pond, lined with a rubber membrane. Dig the storage area large enough to hold all of the water in the feature. Their is a product called Aqua blocks that are placed in the reservoir, this a plastic cube that is strong enough to set rocks on but are hollow to store water. Made like a milk crate.


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## SE18 (Feb 21, 2008)

Jack, that's nice setup you got there. Is there a liner hidden in there? 

Regarding evaporation, the suggestion of a float switch is good, from Todd. 

I have a smallish area where the pump is so running dry is a danger as I leave my setup on 24/7. The pump has a thermal cutoff and I've got a separate low-water detector pressure device hooked up to the pump that works really well so I've got 2 backups to prevent damage as my pump was about $250 and don't want to damage it. I might add a float switch as a 3rd backup, per what Todd has done.


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## PLONIEN (Jul 31, 2008)

There is a liner under the flagstone used for the bottoms of the upper pond, "river" , and the lower sump pond. I wanted everything to be easy to drain, sweep clean, and refill without too much effort. 

Don, photos can be seen on another site, but did not uploade to multiple large scale sites, since most of the folks vist several of them and there is quite a lot of duplication taking up each site's server storage space. Here is a link: 
http://www.largescaleonline.com go to member Team_Member_Pics/jackplon

Note I tried to paste direct url, but this forum software truncates the long url which then becomes unusable. To defeat the software you can cut and paste (add to the link) into your browser /cgi-bin/eimages/eimages.cgi?direct=Team_Member_Pics/jackplon 


****Frustrating that you can't just put a link in the text of this site without automatic conversion to hyperlink which is tuncated.***

Regards, 

Jack


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## toddalin (Jan 4, 2008)

Posted By PLONIEN on 06 May 2011 10:15 AM 


****Frustrating that you can't just put a link in the text of this site without automatic conversion to hyperlink which is tuncated.***

Regards, 

Jack


My biggest complaint about the site! Works the first time, but if you go back to edit the post, it truncates the URL with "..." and the the link will no longer work. Supposedly it doesn't do this if you work in HTML, but who want to look at all that other stuff and what of that other stuff do you need to put in a pic??? *I HATE IT!*


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