Pond restoration - recreating an absolutely "natural" look in an ancient farm pond.
To restore this farm pond and to provide excellent habitat for wildlife, we excavated to the chalk base and then completely covered the new liner in the relined pond with indigenous soil.
The relined pond. This image was taken about seven months after the relining work was completed.
The pond as it was. Almost dry. A pity since this farm pond, now part of a private garden, has been shown on the maps for at least 160 years.
The site marked out ready for machinery to arrive.
Pond cleaned out and excavated to provide the arisings to cover over the liner to a depth of 30 cm. Very tight walled site didn't leave much room for stacking the required quantity of infill material.
As we were deepening the pond - after all, it is no longer a cattle watering spot - there was a fair amount of spoil to ship off site by lorries. This is just part of one shipment stacked on boards on the small lawn next to the drive.
The pond lined with a butyl liner sandwiched between two layers of protective geotextile matting and ready for the introduction of saved arisings to dress over the liner to a depth of 30 cm.
With saved arisings dressed over the liner and a strip of turf to help stabilise the rim, the pond is filling with rainfall. This pond has an artificially large catchment area as it takes rainfall channelled from the drive.