DIY Guide to Ponds, Fountains, Rain Gardens & Water Features, Revised Edition E-Book

• Herausgeber: Creative Homeowner
• Kategorie: Lebensstil
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2023

Seitenzahl: 433

Beschreibung

Plan, create, and enjoy your dream water garden! DIY Guide to Ponds, Fountains, Rain Gardens & Water Features provides essential information on designing and installing all types of home water gardens, from naturalistic to formal, plus fountains, waterfalls, streams, bog gardens, rain gardens, and more. With this expert guide, you'll learn how to construct each of these structures, as well as how to incorporate a variety of aquatic plants, fish, and other pond inhabitants, and even how to design wooden bridges and stepping-stones. You'll also find advice and plants for all regions, plus special tips for gardens in extreme conditions and zone charts. A best-selling resource, this newly updated edition features today's newest technologies and products, such as pond-less waterfall kits for small spaces, as well as a new chapter on constructing naturalistic swimming ponds that are free from chlorine. Also included is new information on construction, planting methods, and various DIY ponds, water features, and rain gardens that are suitable for both small, urban lots and expansive suburban landscapes, making this complete how-to guide accessible for anyone!

Leseprobe

This book may not be reproduced, either in part or in its entirety, in any form, by any means, without written permission from the publisher, with the exception of brief excerpts for purposes of radio, television, or published review. All rights, including the right of translation, are reserved. Note: Be sure to familiarize yourself with manufacturer’s instructions for tools, equipment, and materials before beginning a project. Although all possible measures have been taken to ensure the accuracy of the material presented, neither the author nor the publisher is liable in case of misinterpretation of directions, misapplication, or typographical error.

Creative Homeowner® is a registered trademark of New Design Originals Corporation.

DIY Guide to Ponds, Fountains, Rain Gardens & Water Features

SENIOR EDITOR Kathie Robitz

PRINCIPAL AUTHOR Kathleen Fisher

CONTENT EDITOR Nancy T. Engel

CONSULTING HORTICULTURAL EDITOR Elizabeth P. Stell

INTERIOR DESIGN CONCEPT Glee Barre

GRAPHIC DESIGNER Kathryn Wityk

DIGITAL IMAGING SPECIALIST Mary Dolan

TECHNICAL REVIEWERS Ken Badgley, Carole Ottessen, Mike Stoll, Brian Trimble

INDEXER Schroeder Indexing Services

COVER DESIGN CONCEPT Kathryn Wityk

FRONT COVER PHOTOGRAPHY left Photos Horticultural, design: Paul

Dyer/The Very Interesting Landscape Co.; top right Bluestock/Dreamstime; bottom right Lisa Turay/Dreamstime

BACK COVER PHOTOGRAPHY top right Jerry Pavia; bottom left Photo Horticultural, design: Ash Parish Garden Club

Updated Edition

Managing Editor: Gretchen Bacon

Editors: Joseph Borden and Christa Oestreich

Technical Editor: Nina Koziol

Designer: Chris Morrison

Indexer: Jay Kreider

Proofreader: Jean Bissell

DIY Guide to Ponds, Fountains, Rain Gardens & Water Features, Revised Edition

Print ISBN 978-1-58011-584-1ISBN 978-1-63741-207-7

Library of Congress Control Number: 2022949271

We are always looking for talented authors. To submit an idea, please send a brief inquiry to [email protected].

Creative Homeowner®, www.creativehomeowner.com, is distributed exclusively in North America by Fox Chapel Publishing Company, Inc., 800-457-9112, 903 Square Street, Mount Joy, PA 17552, and in the United Kingdom by Grantham Book Service, Trent Road, Grantham, Lincolnshire, NG31 7XQ.

Dedication

In memory of Kathleen Fisher.

Many people were generous with inspiration and images. Thank you to the following for their help updating this version of the book: Lora Lee Gelles, Publisher, POND Trade Magazine; landscape architects Bob Hursthouse, Hursthouse, Inc., and Mary Allen, Plandscape, Inc.; Larry Carnes, president, Reflections Water Gardens; Jason Lenox, Ponds Inc. of Illinois; Dean MacMorris, Night Light, Inc.; Ashley Marrin, Bret-Mar Landscape; John Magyar, biologist and owner of Universal Aquatics LLC; and Tim Wood, owner of Aquatic Edge Ponds & Landscaping.

Safety First

Though all concepts and methods in this book have been reviewed for safety, it is not possible to overstate the importance of using the safest working methods possible. What follows are reminders—do’s and don’ts for yard work and landscaping. They are not substitutes for your own common sense.

Always use caution, care, and good judgment when following the procedures described in this book.

Before you dig, determine if there are underground utility lines—gas, electric, water, cable, or phone—in the area. Call 811, the national call-before-you-dig phone number. Your state may have an 811 center website where you can request that the approximate location of buried utilities be marked so they are not accidentally hit while digging. Note: previous owners may have installed underground drainage, sprinkler, or lighting lines without mapping them.

Always read and heed the manufacturer’s instructions for using a tool, especially the warnings.

Always ensure that the electrical setup is safe; be sure that no circuit is overloaded and that all power tools and electrical outlets are properly grounded and protected by a ground-fault circuit interrupter (GFCI). Do not use power tools in wet locations.

Always wear eye protection when using chemicals, sawing wood, pruning trees and shrubs, using power tools, and striking metal onto metal or concrete.

Always read labels on chemicals, solvents, and other products; provide ventilation; heed warnings.

Always wear heavy rubber gloves rated for chemicals, not mere household rubber gloves, when handling toxins.

Always wear appropriate gloves in situations in which your hands could be injured by rough surfaces, sharp edges, thorns, or poisonous plants.

Wear safety glasses, a disposable face mask, or a special filtering respirator, when creating sawdust or working with toxic substances.

Keep your hands, other body parts, and clothing away from the business ends of blades, cutters, bits, and other sharp tools.

Always obtain approval from local building officials before undertaking construction of permanent structures.

Never work with power tools when you are tired or under the influence of alcohol or drugs.

Never carry sharp or pointed tools, such as knives or saws, in your pockets. If you carry such tools, use special-purpose tool scabbards.

Metric Equivalents

All measurements in this book are given in U.S. Customary units. If you wish to find metric equivalents, use the following tables and conversion factors.

Inches to Millimeters and Centimeters

1 in = 25.4 mm = 2.54 cm

in

mm

cm

1/16

1.5875

0.1588

1/8

3.1750

0.3175

¼

6.3500

0.6350

3/8

9.5250

0.9525

½

12.7000

1.2700

5/8

15.8750

1.5875

¾

19.0500

1.9050

7/8

22.2250

2.2225

1

25.4000

2.5400

Inches to Centimeters and Meters

1 in = 2.54 cm = 0.0254 m

in

mm

cm

1

2.54

0.0254

2

5.08

0.0508

3

7.62

0.0762

4

10.16

0.1016

5

12.70

0.1270

6

15.24

0.1524

7

17.78

0.1778

8

20.32

0.2032

9

22.86

0.2286

10

25.40

0.2540

11

27.94

0.2794

12

30.48

0.3048

Feet to Meters

1 ft = 0.3048 m

ft

m

1

0.3048

5

1.5240

10

3.0480

25

7.6200

50

15.2400

100

30.4800

Square Feet to Square Meters

1 ft2 = 0.092 903 04 m2

Acres to Square Meters

1 acre = 4046.85642 m2

Cubic Yards to Cubic Meters

1 yd3 = 0.764 555 m3

Ounces and Pounds (Avoirdupois) to Grams

1 oz = 28.349 523 g

1 lb = 453.5924 g

Pounds to Kilograms

1 lb = 0.453 592 37 kg.

Ounces and Quarts to Liters

1 oz = 0.029 573 53 L

1 qt = 0.9463 L

Gallons to Liters

1 gal = 3.785 411 784 L

Fahrenheit to Celsius (Centigrade)

°C = °F – 32 × 5/9

°F

°C

-30

-34.45

-20

-28.89

-10

-23.34

-5

-20.56

0

-17.78

10

-12.22

20

-6.67

30

-1.11

32 (freezing)

0.00

40

4.44

50

10.00

60

15.56

70

21.11

80

26.67

90

32.22

100

37.78

212 (boiling)

100     

Contents

Introduction

Hardiness and Heat Zone Maps

Part 1

A World of Inspiration

CHAPTER 1

Inspiring Ideas: Past and Present

Early Civilizations

Mid-to-Late 1800s

Modern Water Gardens

CHAPTER 2

Planning Your Water Feature

Consider Your Lifestyle

Choosing a Site

Size and Styles

CHAPTER 3

Choosing a Pond Liner and Edging

Liners

Edging

Designing the Pond Configuration

Part 2

Installing Your Pond

CHAPTER 4

Start with a Pond Foundation

Special Sites

Planting-Shelf Options

Extra Support for Pond Foundations

Optional Cement Overliner

Installing a Preformed Shell

CHAPTER 5

Moving Water Features

Design Pointers

Choosing and Buying a Liner

Moving Water

Plumbing Your Moving Water Feature

CHAPTER 6

Fountains and Light

Style and Placement

Spray Fountains

Statuary Fountains

Lighting

CHAPTER 7

Bridges and Stonework

Wooden Bridges

Stepping-Stones

Part 3

Wetland and Rain Gardens

CHAPTER 8

Natural Swimming Pools, Pondside Wetlands, and Rain Gardens

Natural Swimming Pools

Pondside Wetlands

A Freestanding Wetland Garden

Filling Your Wetland Garden

Rain Gardens

CHAPTER 9

Pond Critters

Fish

Choosing Your Fish

Bringing Fish Home

Attracting Birds

Part 4

Water Feature Maintenance

CHAPTER 10

Ecological Balance

How Your Pond Works

Balancing a New Pond

Filtration

Preventing Disease Transmission

CHAPTER 11

Routine Tasks

Season to Season

Troubleshooting

Part 5

Plants, Plants, and More Plants

CHAPTER 12

Plant Encyclopedia

What’s Your Style?

The Role Plants Play

Beauty or Beast?

Submerged Plants (Oxygenators)

Floating Plants

Water Lilies

Lotuses

Marginal Plants

Plants for the Periphery

Shrubs

Trees

About the Technical Editor

Glossary

Credits

Introduction

Earth. Fire. Wind. Water. Our ancestors were fascinated by those elements, and they continue to captivate us in gardens today. Water is often an overlooked feature for residential gardens, but the sound of trickling or cascading water can be very relaxing. It can also mask some of the street noise in urban areas. This book will help lead the way as you create a beautiful water feature of your own.

A traditional Japanese garden may inspire you to adapt one or two elements and incorporate them into your own design.

An ornamental water feature can be as simple as a fountain, a birdbath, or a contemporary pondless waterfall. It can be a deeper, koi-filled pond, fed by water that cascades gently over large boulders and flows slowly down a meandering stream. Or it could be an elegant fountain or formal pool (or both) in front of your home. Whatever form it takes, water adds tranquility, provides pleasant reflections of the sky and clouds, and adds ambiance to a garden. This book is organized to inspire you and provide practical, hands-on information.

Join me as we tour historical water gardens through the centuries—all inspiration from the past. Discover ways to plan and design your water feature, and how you can make it an integral part of your home landscape. A good, basic plan helps ensure that your pond, fountain, or other water element will bring you, your family, and your visitors delight for years to come. We cover the nuts and bolts of installing a pond, beginning with how to sketch your ideas on paper. Proper installation is the key to long-lasting enjoyment of a pond. The sections on moving water—fountains and sprays—as well as lighting, stonework, and bridges offer tempting ideas in the pages ahead. And for something completely different, we’ve included a section on “natural” swimming pools—without chlorine or other chemicals.

Rain gardens show how to capture water runoff so it replenishes the groundwater without spilling into a pond. We’ll also tackle attracting (or discouraging) critters, routine maintenance, and plant selection for inside and around your pond.

There’s no better inspiration than nature. You can create a naturalistic look for your pond using free-form shapes, plantings, and stones.

Hardiness Zone Map

The Hardiness-Zone Map developed by the Agricultural Research Service of the USDA divides the country into 13 zones according to average minimum winter temperatures. Hardiness zones are used to identify regions to which plants are suited based on their cold tolerance, which is what “hardiness” means. Many factors, such as elevation and moisture level, come into play when determining whether a plant is suitable for your region. Local climates may vary from what is shown on this map. Contact your local Cooperative Extension Service for recommendations for your area. Or go to www.planthardiness.ars.usda.gov to find your hardiness zone based on your zip code. Mapping by the PRISM Climate Group, Oregon State University.

AHS Heat-Zone Map

The American Horticultural Society Heat-Zone Map divides the United States into 12 zones based on the average annual number of days a region’s temperatures climb above 86°F (30°C), the temperature at which the cellular proteins of plants begin to experience injury. Introduced in 1998, the AHS Heat-Zone Map holds significance, especially for gardeners in southern and transitional zones. Nurseries, growers, and other plant sources will gradually begin listing both cold hardiness and heat tolerance zones for plants, including grass plants. Using the USDA Plant Hardiness map, which can help determine a plant’s cold tolerance, and the AHS Heat-Zone Map, gardeners will be able to safely choose plants that tolerate their region’s lowest and highest temperatures.

Canada’s Plant Hardiness Zone Map

Canada’s Plant Hardiness Zone Map outlines the different zones in Canada where various types of trees, shrubs, and flowers will most likely survive. It is based on the average climatic conditions of each area. The hardiness map is divided into nine major zones: the harshest is 0 and the mildest is 8. Relatively few plants are suited to zone 0. Subzones (e.g., 4a or 4b, 5a or 5b) are also noted in the map legend. These subzones are most familiar to Canadian gardeners. Some significant local factors, such as micro-topography, amount of shelter, and subtle local variations in snow cover, are too small to be captured on the map. Year-to-year variations in weather and gardening techniques can also have a significant impact on plant survival in any particular location.

PART 1

A World of Inspiration

A garden is an invitation to a wonderful sensory experience. Colorful flowers, fragrant herbs, and the sound of birds draw us outdoors. A water feature adds a different, unexpected dimension. It reflects the sky and clouds. It may be a bubbling fountain, a cascading waterfall, or the flash of a golden-yellow fish in a pond that excites us. Large or small, liquid assets can enhance the garden. But first, you need a plan.

CHAPTER 1

Inspiring Ideas: Past and Present

Humans have long valued water. We know it as the sustainer of life and sense it as a source of our origins. The earliest recorded water gardens reflect these things: the need for water to drink and bathe, the necessity to irrigate life-sustaining crops, the desire for a sense of coolness and for comforting sounds in harsh surroundings, a need to control nature, and in many religious traditions, a connection with the Creator.

This is where water gardens began—in the Cradle of Civilization, located between the Taurus Moutains of eastern Asia Minor and the Persian Gulf.

Fountains Abbey, in North Yorkshire, England, is the remains of a medieval Cistercian monastery.

Early Civilizations

The Cradle of Civilization was the birthplace of water gardens. The inhabitants of ancient Mesopotamia (which corresponds to modern-day Iraq and parts of Iran, Syria, and Turkey) owed their success to their ability to control the Tigris and Euphrates rivers. They developed a complex system of canals and waterworks for irrigation. Evidence of ornamental water gardens from this period is limited to a few artifacts—a carved water basin from 3000 BCE and a stone fountain from about 1,000 years later.

The Assyrians, who inhabited the southern half of the Tigris and east, built vast hunting parks, and lifted water at least three stories high to plant the temple towers called ziggurats, the most famous of which were the Hanging Gardens of Babylon.

The Egyptians harnessed the Nile River with a device called the “shadoof ” or “shaduf,” consisting of a horizontal pole attached to a pivot with a bucket on one end and a counterweight on the other. Carvings and relics in Egyptian tombs show us that they had elaborate pleasure gardens, where these desert dwellers could escape the heat.

In a tomb built in Thebes around 1400 BCE, archeologists found plans for a garden divided into four main areas with a rectangular pond in each. This cross-shaped motif often featured lotus plantings. Egyptians revered the lotus as medicine and a religious symbol. Another early water garden plant was the bulrush, famous for hiding the abandoned infant Moses in the Bible, but also used to fashion ropes, mats, sails, and to construct rafts solid enough to transport stone obelisks.

Ancient Egyptians drew water from the Nile with a simple device called a shadoof.

In the middle of the eighteenth century, the Landscape Movement in Great Britain inspired a naturalistic style that emphasized water rather than heavy planting. Here, the reflection of the house in the water enhances the overall landscape.

PERSIA

TThe citizens of Persia (now Iran) also divided their gardens with cross-shaped channels, a form they called “chahar-bagh.” Cyrus the Great, in the sixth century BCE, watered his garden through underground channels called “qanats,” made by drilling a shaft to the source of water, then sloping a channel to its destination.

About a century later a descendant, Cyrus the Younger, is credited with coining the word “paradise” (although certainly not the concept) for a garden. He named his garden “Pairidaeza,” from the Persian words meaning “around” and “wall.” Persians loved their gardens so much that they wove their designs into rugs to enjoy them in winter.

When Islamic Arabs invaded Persia in 637 CE, it launched the spread of this garden throughout the Islamic world for at least a millennium. These road-and-dust-weary nomads were enchanted by the walled gardens and further inspired by the Koran, in which Mohammed described paradise as a garden complete with fountains.

The Generalife. In the thirteenth century, the Moors—descendants of Arabs and Berbers who invaded Spain in 711 CE—built two exemplary gardens in existence today in the hills overlooking Granada, Spain. The Generalife Palace and Gardens was the leisure summer residence for the kings of Granada. The garden is romantic, intimate, and sensual. The Generalife Gardens include the Patio de la Acequia (Court of the Water Channel).

Alhambra. Gardens of the Alhambra (Red Castle) are massive and expansive as befits a fortress, which it was. In the Court of the Lions, a dozen carved King of Beasts spout water into a hexagonal pool and hold aloft a 12-sided fountain basin. Around the edges of this court, alabaster columns support ornate arcades.

India. Some 7,000 miles away in Mogol India (captured by Asian warlords such as Tamberlane and Genghis Khan in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries), gardens reflected the Persian influence in their canals and geometric shapes. They harnessed rivers to fuel water features, notably the chute called the “chadar.”

In the late 1500s, hundreds of Mogul gardens were built at the foot of the Himalayas in Kashmir, where water flowed down the mountains and into Lake Dal. One of those surviving is Shalamar Bagh, as famous for its name, meaning “place of love,” as for its series of pavilions surrounded by water. The nearby Nishat Bagh is made breathtaking by a central canal descending over 12 levels, each linked by a broad chadar. Over these falls, water plays over indentations in the rocks, which are angled to capture sunlight.

Taj Mahal. The Moguls are also famous for their tomb gardens, particularly The Taj Mahal, built between 1632 and 1654 by the last Mogul emperor, Shah Jahan, in memory of his favorite wife, Mumtaz Mahal. He broke tradition by positioning the tomb at one end of the cross-shaped canal, rather than in the center, so that the entire structure is reflected.

Moorish water garden. The Generalife is a sensual garden near Granada and was a summer residence for Spanish rulers.

The Taj Mahal, the most famous of the Indian tomb gardens, honors the memory of a Mogul emperor’s favorite wife.

ASIA

The earliest Chinese gardens, like those of the Assyrians, were sprawling hunting parks. Their emperors, beginning at least with the Han dynasty (20 to 220 CE), built lakes covering hundreds of acres as centers for boating and socializing. But even though most of these lakes were artificial—and in winter, sometimes the flowers were, too—nature was the ideal in these as well as in small private gardens. Many of the latter have been reconstructed in Suzhou, sometimes called the “Venice of the East,” where canals and enclosed courtyard gardens lap at the foundations of homes and other buildings.

Confucius set the tone for Chinese gardens in 500 BCE, with the axiom that “the wise find joy in water, the benevolent find joy in mountains.” These two elements—the water representing the female, or yin, and rocks the male, or yang—have been central to Asian gardens ever since. Just as feng shui is the art of creating interior spaces with positive energy, the goal of shanshui (the word for landscaping that means mountains and water) is to bring energy to gardens.

Western gardeners often remark that plants play a secondary role in Asian gardens, although this is less true than it was for the Islamic or Italian Renaissance gardens, where the majority of plantings were evergreens. In China, the favored plants were the three friends of water (plum, bamboo, and pine), and peonies, chrysanthemums, and of course, lotuses. Lotuses were especially sacred to Buddhists, who believed that Buddha was born in the heart of a lotus.

In 612 AD a missionary from Japan described the Chinese imperial gardens to his own empress, who adapted the lake-and-island motif for her gardens. Although the basics of Asian gardening have changed little over the centuries, as they have in the West, there are some distinct periods of influence that changed garden design:

The Heian period (795–1195), which further emphasized reproducing natural beauty in small landscapes, with specific suggestions for the diversion of streams and placement of rocks. Ponds were to be shaped like a crane in flight and islands like a turtle, both symbolizing eternity.

Momoyamam (1573–1603), when the tea garden came to the forefront, with the introduction of water basins for that ceremony and stepping-stones across lakes.

Edo (1603–1867). Edo was the name for Tokyo until 1869, and this burgeoning city saw the development of wealthy estates with attendant large lakes.

Some Japanese gardens are stroll gardens, intended to take visitors on a contemplative journey, while true contemplation gardens are to be viewed from indoors or a terrace. When bringing water to a garden is impossible, the Japanese suggest water with the placement of rounded stones.

Egyptians and Chinese revered the lotus flower, here depicted by Yum Shou-Ping (1633–1690) in Album of Flowers.

Garden design is an artform that has existed in Japan for centuries. This traditional design is located in Kyoto.

ANCIENT GREECE, ROME, AND THE RENAISSANCE

The ancient Greeks did not create artificial water gardens around their homes, but rather, revered natural areas endowed with springs, which they believed were homes of gods and nymphs. Later, these were embellished with statuary, and in time evolved into elaborate nymphaea, or water theaters.

Romans. The Romans were considerably more ambitious. Pliny the Younger (62 to 113 CE) left detailed records of his hillside garden, where a pool with a tall water jet alternately filled and emptied and water gushed from a stone cistern under a semicircular marble bench into a marble basin below. Pliny’s villa also featured a hippodrome—a structure for horse races—as did that of Hadrian, emperor from 117 to 138 CE. Hadrian’s, at Tivoli, contained a central canal longer than 5 football fields. His circular Marine Theater contained a pool with an island, on which stood a pavilion large enough to have its own garden and several rooms. Surviving still is the Canopus, a curving colonnaded canal in an excavated valley. That more modest private gardens did exist we know courtesy of Mount Vesuvius’ eruption in 79 CE. It preserved for all time the city of Pompeii, where small open spaces, surrounded by colonnades, often contained basins with fountains. It was during the Renaissance in the sixteenth century that Italy and then France developed the ornate classical-style water gardens and fountains.

The Greeks believed springs were home to gods and embellished them as elaborate water theaters.

Italian Renaissance. Many Italian Renaissance water features evoked scholarly subjects. There were the massive stone fountains carved by great artists of the time such as Andrea del Verrocchio (Boy with a Dolphin), frequently depicting goddesses such as Venus or January shivering in the cold. But these artisans had an equally playful side. They devised grottos to frighten visitors, whimsical beings animated by water (automata) to amaze them, and water games (giochi d’acqua) to play tricks on them.

Tivoli. Considered the ultimate example of this creativity is the Villa d’Este at Tivoli. Designed by Pirro Ligorio for the Cardinal Ippolito d’Este, it was sited at the top of a steep slope with views to Rome and the Sabine Hills. The fountains are powered by diverting water—over 300 gallons a second—from a nearby river. Its most famous feature is the Terrace of One Hundred Fountains, where terraces hold three rows of spouts punctuated with carvings of eagles and obelisks.

The towering geysers of its Organ Fountain are indeed reminiscent of a mighty organ’s pipes, but in fact the fountain was named for its sound, as were the Owl and Dragon fountains. Elsewhere, stair rails are also water chutes, and water spurts from the breasts of a sphinxlike creature.

Villa Lante. At the Villa Lante, the sides of a narrow canal called a catena d’acqua are scrolled to look like a chain. While the more reverential Muslims raised the sides of water channels as an invitation to sit and contemplate the heavens, here architect Giacomo Vignola built a long table with a trough in the center with more earthly intent—cooling wine.

Grottoes. These water features had their origins in the nymphaea of ancient Greece. In the classical world, they evolved into ornate terraces or rooms with statues, columns, and balustrades. The grotto, on the other hand, retained a pretense of being a rough-hewn cave while becoming ever more elaborate and fanciful. Like the Haunted House at an amusement park, grottoes combined bits of lore with special effects, with the same results—squeals and nervous laughter. Some went for glitter, with crystal stalactites and high ceilings encrusted with semiprecious stones and imported seashells. One that Bernardo Buontalenti created for the Medicis at Boboli featured a sculpture of slaves by Michelangelo and was lit by a crystal fish bowl inserted in its roof.

At the Villa Pratolino, a Medici garden that no longer exists, he gave free reign to his playful side, in some cases combining automation with classical figures such as the Apennine (January), pressing his hand on the head of a sea creature to squeeze water from its mouth. A washerwoman appeared to wring water from a marble cloth. Guests who weren’t soaked by squirting benches were drenched by jets on staircases. Water-activated whistles imitated numerous bird species.

On a purely grand scale were the baroque water theaters, most notably the one built at Villa Aldobrandini for Pope Clement VIII. Created as a semicircular amphitheater behind the villa, its balustraded wall is punctuated with huge niches inhabited by statues. In the central cove, Atlas stands atop a hill of stones hoisting on his shoulders a globe that releases a curtain of water. But the show continues above him, where a steep water staircase, flanked by two spiral-dominated pillars, is cut into the wooded hillside.

The most famous feature of this Tivoli garden is the Terrace of One Hundred Fountains, with three rows of water spouts.

This scroll-sided canal, the Catena d’Acqua (chain of water), was designed for Cardinal Giovanni Francesco.

FRANCE

As the Italian influence flowed to France, its style was first copied and then adapted, with the baroque flourishes and aquatic playfulness displaced by emphasis on tying architecture to the formal landscape on a sweeping scale. In many cases, these grand gardens were extensions of the moat-surrounded French chateau. Because the landscape sites were often much flatter than in Italy, cascades gave way to reflecting pools and parterres, gardens with paths between features. Italian Renaissance style moved most literally across international lines via the Francinis. One of them, Thomas, had been at Pratolino before he and two brothers came to France to work for King Henry IV (whose wife was Marie de Medici) in the 1590s. (Thomas’s sons would eventually work for Louis XIV at Versailles.)

At Saint-Germain-en-Laye, the Francinis filled the royal garden with fountains, grottoes, and automata. But it was the garden of Cardinal Richilieu at Rueil, begun in 1610, where the brothers made their biggest splash (so to speak). Bringing water a mile and a quarter by aqueduct, they powered among other things an immense cascade and two grottoes. In one grotto, satyrs and nymphs spouted water from their genitals, and visitors could manipulate a water spout to form flowers, umbrellas, stars, and other shapes.

Seventeenth-Century France. Another hallmark of this period was converting shallow muddy areas into lakes or canals by giving them a new artificial edge. At the royal gardens at Fontainebleu southeast of Paris, for instance, a marsh was shaped into a triangular lake. The chateau was further surrounded by moats on other sides. Later, Thomas Francini’s brother Alexandre would add his famous Tiber fountain. But it was Andre Le Notre who, after putting the finishing touches on Fountainebleu, created the three gardens considered to be exemplary of seventeenth-century France: Chantilly, Vaux-le-Vicomte, and Versailles.

Chantilly. A relatively small chateau, Chantilly was surrounded by large moats but positioned so that Le Notre chose to open vistas in two directions. Andre Le Notre edged an existing river to form the Grand Canal more than 100 yards across and extending a mile before turning a half mile in a second direction. Chantilly also is characterized by a water parterre, long vistas, and a series of rectangular, round, and oval reflecting basins. The chateau there was destroyed during the Revolution 200 years after its constuction, but has been rebuilt.

Vaux-le-Vicomte. Owned by Louis XIV’s finance minister, Vaux-le-Vicomte is an example of the moated chateau. The garden, surrounded by woods, descends slowly past an immense parterre of swirling greenery. The main canal, some 1,100 yards long, is concealed from visitors by a terrace, but far in the distance they can see a grotto with seven immense arched niches, topped by a balustraded terrace, then a hillside sweeping up toward a statue of Hercules. Between the house and main canal is the Grand Miroir d’Eau, a square pool that reflects the entire water-surrounded chateau. The effect has been compared to that of the Taj Mahal, which was completed two years before Le Notre began work here. A buttressed cascade tumbles down from the platform on which the chateau seems to float, but there are few fountains. Instead, this garden is famous for the exquisite proportions and perfect relationship of its elements.

Temple of Venus. Le Notre used water to bring life to the Temple of Venus and the sprawling landscape of Versailles in France.

Peterhof. At the palace of Russia’s Peter the Great in Peterhof, a canal flows to the sea between jets of water.

Versailles. One of the most famous gardens in Europe, Versailles was the playground of the Sun King, Louis XIV. While the major design of the garden was carried out in the mid-1660s, both structure and landscape saw expansion over several decades.

Individual features may sound like echoes of other Le Notre designs—a cross-shaped canal (5,900 by 4,920 feet), a water parterre, numerous reflecting basins—but what sets it apart are both the sprawling site and the skillful way he used water to make it vibrant, rather than an outdoor museum. Like many Renaissance gardens, its sculpture focused on a classical theme, in this case Apollo the sun god. In one of Versailles’s most photographed images, Apollo rises from a pool on his horse-drawn chariot. In the water parterre are two pools that reflect the palace façade; beyond the vast orange grove is a lake 765 yards long. On cross axes with the grand canal are bosquets—groves of trees—each framing a fountain that continues the Apollo legend. Unlike Chantilly, water resources were not up to the task, and it was a constant struggle to pressurize the 1,400 water jets.

The Sun King’s grandson Philip V was more fortunate in this regard when, as King of Spain, he tried to copy Versailles at La Granja, where two reservoirs collected water from surrounding mountains. That garden in turn inspired the Palazzo Reale near Naples, the home of Philip’s son Charles III and site of what is considered the grandest of all cascades, stretching almost two miles up a hillside and fed by an aqueduct almost 25 miles long.

Peterhof. In St. Petersburg, Russia, the palace and park at Peterhof (also known as Petrodvorets) are often referred to as the Russian Versailles. The Emperor of Russia, Peter I (the Great), founded Peterhof in 1709 as a country estate. After visiting France in 1717, he decided to make Peterhof into an imperial residence that would rival Versailles. The Grand Cascade has 64 fountains and more than 200 statues, bas-reliefs, and other decorations.

Neptune fountain in Versailles. The fountain represents Neptune, the ancient god of seas and oceans.

ENGLAND

Elsewhere in Europe, gardens were relatively austere. The Dutch and Germans preferred formal canals, jets rather than fountains, and relatively little sculpture. An example is Herrenhausen in Germany, begun in 1680, where water adds movement to rectangular patterns of tall trees and hedges.

Chatsworth. A notable exception to this restraint is Chatsworth, developed over two centuries beginning with the first Duke of Glouchester in the late seventeenth century. From a domed “cascade” house built by baroque architect Thomas Archer, a 24-foot-wide water stair tumbles down a hill toward the house. A pupil of Le Notre designed other waterworks. In the eighteenth century, the grounds would take a step toward the future with the work of Capability Brown, who altered the course of the nearby Derwent River to give the home a more picturesque approach.

Beginning in 1826, under the sixth Duke of Devonshire, head gardener Joseph Paxton attempted to link artifice and nature, shaping rocky cascades and woodland water features. The Duke, wanting to impress Russia’s Czar Nicholas I on a planned visit, had Paxton build the single-jet Emperor Fountain. Powered by gravity from a lake 381 feet higher, it was then the tallest jet in the world at 290 feet. (The czar became ill and never saw it.) Paxton also designed the famed Crystal Palace, built to house the temperate world’s first giant waterlily, Victoria amizonica, with pads more than six feet across.

Landscape Movement. Beginning with the first half of the eighteenth century, the Landscape Movement led a trend away from enclosed outdoor rooms and toward gardens that linked architecture to the world beyond. As in Asia, nature was the model to emulate. Fountains and jets were considered gauche. “Only the vulgar citizen...squirts up his rivulets in jettaux,” wrote one critic. Instead, designers created waterfalls, bubbling streams, rocky ravines, or rills—narrow channels that wound among trees or hillocks. By 1819, even the ingenious design at Villa Pratolino in Italy would be replaced by an English-style garden. Somewhat ironically, those who espoused the natural landscape often altered both wetlands and historic gardens in ways that would be unthinkable or even illegal today.

Blenheim Palace. This French-influenced water parterre was built for the Duke of Marlborough at Blenheim, his Oxfordshire, England, estate, in the 1920s.

Monet’s Garden. The artist Monet broke from tradition by damming a stream to create his romantic and heavily planted pond.

Mid-to-Late 1800s

By the mid-1800s, there were fewer grand private estates where landscape architects could move even miniature mountains or streams. Public parks became a more frequent subject for water-garden designers. Joseph Paxton’s design for Birkenhead Park near Liverpool, with two labyrinthine lakes and an island, inspired American Frederick Law Olmsted’s work in New York’s Central Park, Brooklyn’s Prospect Park, and Boston’s Back Bay.

Monet’s Garden. In the 1890s, artist Claude Monet made a radical move at Giverny by damming a stream to create his famous pond. Divorced from any reference to the surrounding architecture, it was lushly and sensuously planted, inspiring most of his late work—and many romantically inclined gardeners today. In the early twentieth century, architect Edwin Lutyens and plantswoman Gertrude Jekyll were a famous pair, billed as collaborators but often disagreeing about whether structure or plantings should get top billing. One of Lutyens’s favorite water features was the dipping well: an arched alcove where a basin was fed by a spout. Adapted from Renaissance designs, it nevertheless fit beautifully in small landscapes.

Longwood Gardens. The fountain garden is a famous feature of this Pennsylvania estate built by Pierre du Pont in the early 1900s.

Jekyll, known for her lavish perennial borders and use of flower color, recommended restraint in the number of species planted adjacent to a pond. She recommended planting the garden leading away from the pond to segue into natural areas beyond with spring wildflowers, then larger perennials and shrubs leading toward water-loving trees.

Modern Water Gardens

We can thank modern technology for making water gardens available to anyone with a shovel and an electrical supply, rather than just to royalty and others who could afford teams of engineers, architects, and artisans.

In Victorian times, the steam pump brought water to some gardens, but even then, most relied on gravity. When soil wouldn’t hold water, it had to be “puddled” by stomping straw into clay. The first rubber liners came along in the late nineteenth century, and have steadily become both more durable and less expensive, as have pumps and filters.

Modern Perspective. What hasn’t changed much are our motivations for creating water gardens. More imperative for many of us now, perhaps, is the recognition that our natural environment is shrinking.

Seattle Center. The Dandelion Fountain, at Seattle Center, an entertainment complex, exemplifies modern public water features.

CHAPTER 2

Planning Your Water Feature

Water is one of life’s vital elements—it’s no surprise that we find ourselves attracted to it. What better place to enjoy water but in your own garden? A well-designed landscape with a water feature requires thoughtful consideration and preparation. Careful planning helps prevent first-time mistakes. Adding a water feature to the garden deserves thoughtful placement and installation. Will it be a focal point in your garden? Will it be enjoyed from indoors when you can’t be outside? Will it be lit at night? Determine what feature is right for you—from the style and size to where it is located—before you start.

Consider Your Lifestyle

When professional landscape designers begin a project, they ask about the client’s lifestyle and goals for their property. Consider how you use your outdoor space. Do you spend a lot of time outside enjoying your property? Do you want your pond or fountain to beautify the view from inside the house or to enhance your entryway for the pleasure of your guests? Your budget is also a consideration before you make a selection.

When your time outdoors is limited to relaxing on the patio or deck, a pondless waterfall or fountain may be all you want or need. If you enjoy entertaining in your garden, a small water feature softly bubbling in a corner can be relaxing and prompt quiet conversation. A pond provides endless entertainment especially if it contains colorful fish. An informal pond placed near a deck or patio allows you and your guests to admire the fish and unusual plants, as well as birds, dragonflies, and other wildlife that are attracted to water.

If you have a patio that looks out over a long, narrow garden, you can make the space look even deeper by installing a long formal pool or placing a pond at the far end to create a focal point. Keep the lines of a more remote water feature clean and bold so that the design can speak from a distance.

If you enjoy gardening, a new water feature can be as simple or as demanding as you like. As with any other part of a landscape, a pond offers endless possibilities. You can add plants or rearrange your existing plants. There are many colorful aquatic plants that can sit in or around a pond. There’s the added enticement of adding fish and other creatures like turtles.

Or perhaps the pond will be a secondary feature to existing flower beds and borders. For example, one gardener used a backhoe to dig a half-acre pond as the centerpiece of a collection of unusual trees and shrubs. The beautiful colors and shapes are reflected in the water, which can be viewed from his sunroom. Another gardener placed a three-tiered fountain as a focal point off the patio. Because she lives in an area that has very cold winters, the fountain is turned off and covered for the season. Your climate will also help you determine what type of water feature works best. Good planning results in a water feature that requires minimal maintenance and provides enjoyment for years to come.

The hardy water lily’s beauty, above, and the colors and fragrance of some varities, can be the inspiration for creating a lush water garden. They bloom by day and by night, so you can enjoy their pleasure for hours.

Including a relaxing, low-maintenance water feature can add value to your home.

Choosing a Site

Whether you live in an urban setting with a small yard or a sweeping suburban lot, there may be spots for a water feature or two. But where will it give you the most pleasure while being practical? In a large garden, the water feature can be a pleasant destination tucked among the plants. Any water element should look as though it belongs where it is placed.

A pond with fish is a delightful way to engage children with nature.

AESTHETIC CONSIDERATIONS

Your view of a pond, fountain or pondless waterfall is critical. Ideally, it would be nice to watch a pond change throughout the seasons from as many vantage points as possible. From indoors, you can enjoy your pond even in inclement weather: the reflection of the clouds, the splash of raindrops, the formation of ice. If your region has long winters or if you spend relatively little time outdoors, think about where you might be able to see the pond from one or more windows.

Before you dig, consider whether you’ll be able to see the water feature from your intended viewing location. For example, if you want to view the pond outside a breakfast nook, will you be able to see it when you are sitting down? You can “test drive” your pond by placing a blue plastic drop cloth or a blanket or sheets in various spots to experiment with positioning and size of a pond. If it’s a fountain you are after, use large cardboard boxes for placement and size.

One other consideration is whether or not your local building codes will require fencing depending on a pond’s depth. In some communities, fencing is required to keep children from entering the pond.

If positioned near a window, a water feature will give you year-round enjoyment.

HIDDEN WATER FEATURE

You can employ a landscape-design trick known as evoking a sense of mystery. Instead of putting the pond in full view, hide it so that just a teasing glimpse beckons and invites strollers to investigate. Between the path and the pond, plant tall grasses or a hedge of lacy conifers—or erect a bamboo screen or vine-covered trellis—allowing just a shimmer of water to hint at what lies beyond.

A completely hidden water feature offers other advantages. You can still create a sense of mystery by beckoning a viewer toward a camouflaged pond with a curving path. Such a concealed pond can be a welcome retreat where you can be alone with your thoughts, enjoy the sights and sounds of nature, and forget the chores that await you in the study or laundry room for a while. To make this area even more of an outdoor “room,” add decking (or a flagstone or gravel floor), a dining table, and lighting so that you can enjoy it at night. Total enclosure of a water feature is especially appealing if you are surrounded on all sides by sights and sounds that you want to block out: heavy traffic, nearby neighbors, or a less-than-beautiful toolshed, for example.

Tucked out of sight, a pond offers an element of surprise while strolling the garden.

This beautiful tropical garden contains a decorative bridge over a waterfall that empties into a large pond.

Reflections. In considering views from your pond, remember that you will want to look not only across it but also into it. What will be reflected in the pond, and how will those reflections change throughout the day and throughout the seasons? Can you capture sunrises or sunsets? The full moon in June? What about azaleas in spring or maple leaves in autumn? Some experts suggest placing a large mirror on the prospective pond site to give you some idea of how water might reflect light and color. If you’re a photographer, you know it’s easier to see the image well if you keep the sun behind you, and this is true of ponds as well. If you’re staring straight across at the sun, all you’ll see is glare.

Existing Features. Another important aesthetic consideration when choosing a site is how easily the water feature can be integrated into the existing landscape. Determine which existing yard features will complement the pond and which will detract from it. Before deciding on a site, examine the views from all angles. For example, siting the pond in one area of the yard may mean that you would need to remove one or more large trees or shrubs to allow you to see the pond from the house. Or you may find eyesores such as an old shed that will need to be razed or a bare house wall that should be disguised with vines.

BORROW VIEWS

When picking a spot for your pond, see whether there are any views worth “borrowing” for your design. Borrowing a pleasing but more distant view is like adding a window to your garden room. It makes a small enclosure seem larger without sacrificing privacy. Decide which elements of the wider world to allow into your cozy spot. Consider the potential view from each side of the pond to see what pleasant vista you could incorporate—the corner of a neighbor’s lot with a perennial bed or expanse of green lawn, or a view back toward your own house where you have plantings you enjoy. A hedge of just the right height can capture the top of a church steeple or tall trees while blocking out lessattractive lower views. If there is a nice view from only one side of the pond, draw attention to it with a small area of stone, brick, or wood decking. A bench or a lantern will suggest a place of welcome. It doesn’t need to be functional; the bench can be a rustic child-size seat, and the lantern can be stone or a battered antique.

To soften a pond’s edge, plant evergreens, grasses, and perennials.

Ample seating provides a place to relax, entertain, and enjoy this formal pool.

If you have decided on a particular size for your pond, you’ll need to take that into consideration when choosing the site. For example, a small pond can get lost next to an immense deck. A large pond stuffed into a small side yard may look out of proportion.

Many ponds look like a hole in the ground with a necklace of stones, and gardeners don’t solve the problem by adding a starched collar of plants. Ponds look more natural anchored to an existing feature such as a large boulder or a small specimen tree or tucked into the curve of a perennial or shrub border.

If you don’t have such an existing feature, you may need to create one. Or you can connect the pond to the rest of the garden by echoing other elements in the landscape. Incorporate bricks in the pond’s design to complement a brick house, a deck surround to mimic the deck on the house, a shape similar to that of the planting beds, or plants of the same species (or shape) as planted elsewhere.

Paths. Paths are another way to tie your pond to the rest of your landscape and to your home. (See the sidebar “Pond Surrounds and Paths,” on here, for more information.)

For a small pond, a little shade reduces algae and evaporation, and keeps visitors cool.

Factor in reflections when siting your pond. Water lets you double your visual enjoyment of the landscape’s existing features such as trees and rocks.

PRACTICAL CONSIDERATIONS

Other elements will determine where to place your water feature. Will you be able to view the water from indoors or from a patio or deck? Existing structures, trees and shrubs, and the general lay of the land must be considered.

Sun and Shade. If you want flowering plants to be an important part of your water garden, you need to place the pond where it will get at least six hours of sunlight a day. Water lilies, in particular, don’t bloom well with less sun (although there are a few varieties that will perform in partial shade). If you’ve recently moved to your property, keep records through each season the first year on how much sunlight lands and where. This can help you decide whether a site will meet the needs for your water feature.

Depending on where you live, there is a downside to too much sun, however. Water will evaporate quickly from a pond in full sun in hot climates. Sun encourages algae, and if the pond is small, can heat the water too much for fish. For this reason, small water features—and especially tub gardens—need shadier sites. For larger ponds, provide shade with floating plants or situate small trees to give dappled shade across at least part of the pond’s surface. Use rocks to create shade under which fish can cool off, as well as hide from predators. Nature creates inviting pools even in the heart of heavily shaded woodlands, and you can, too, by choosing appropriate plants.

Wind. Ponds should have some degree of protection from wind, which, like sunlight, will hasten the rate of evaporation. Wind can also blow leaves and other debris into the pond, spoil the grace of fountains, and knock over tall plants in containers. If possible, choose a sheltered site, one protected from wind by a hill, woods, building, or fence.

If your site is open and has no sheltered spot, you’ll need to create some type of a windbreak. Surprisingly, a barrier that lets some wind through is more effective than a solid windbreak such as a close-board fence, which allows wind to blow across its top and resume full force a few feet beyond it. Depending on the style of your pond, you can create an effective windbreak by installing an open-board fence, a screen of native evergreens, or an attractive flowering hedge.

Trees can be used to create shade or as a windbreak. Careful selection and placement is important. Many fastgrowing trees are inexpensive, but their branches may be brittle and messy. When adding new trees near your pond, choose species that will stay small or are slow growing.

Trees can add to your cleanup chores by dropping twigs, berries, nuts, and leaves into the pond, where this debris may decompose and change the water’s chemistry. Some plants that otherwise make attractive windbreaks—such as yews, hollies, rhododendrons, and mountain laurels—have toxic leaves that can harm fish if allowed to accumulate. Pine needles contain tannins that can turn water brown and sicken fish. A willow or maple tree’s roots can punch through pond liners that have even the tiniest of leaks.

COMPLYING WITH LOCAL REGULATIONS

Make sure your plans comply with local building codes. Depending on where you live, regulations may deem a pond beyond a certain depth a safety hazard and, just as they do with swimming pools, require that you fence it. Fencing may be required for ponds as shallow as 2 feet. Most zoning boards consider a pond a structure, and as such there may also be rules pertaining to its placement and size.

If you intend to redesign a natural water feature, such as a pond or stream, you would be altering a wetland. In that case, find out if you need to apply for a permit, usually with your local conservation commission, department of natural resources, or other environmental review agency. But keep in mind, this process usually involves preparing a complex and legally demanding environmental impact statement.

This pond’s location, opposite, offers a perfect view and just the right amount of sun and shade.

Before you lift a shovel, check with your municipality to see if permits are required and contact utility companies to mark underground cables, pipes, and electrical lines.

Microclimates

Trees, shrubs, fences, the house, garage, or shed can all create “microclimates.” It may be a sheltered site between a fence and the house. It can be cool and shady on the north side of house and warm and sunny on the south. A west-facing site receives the hot afternoon sunlight while the east side may have only gentle morning sunlight.