If you are a pond lover like me, then you may have a pond or two in your yard that could use some rejuvenation. There have been many ponds installed with the old skimmer and biofalls systems of the ’90s. Many of these ponds were also built with steep slopes and tiny or no rock and gravel. Maybe you’ve got an old pond that has seen its better days, or perhaps you have just outgrown it and have been dreaming of getting something more prominent. Whatever the case, we can rejuvenate your old existing pond for you in a few days at prices starting around $5000.
Give us a Call
Whatever your current pond situation might be, give us a call. I’d be happy to come out and talk to you about pond rejuvenation options. We can take a look at what you’ve got, plan something new and different, talk through the many options and get you a down to the dollar bid with no surprises. I guess what I am saying is it can’t hurt to dream.
The Pond Industry Emerges
In the ’90s. Aquascapes came out with the whole skimmer and biofalls concept, and it was revolutionary! They gave us a box for the waterfall and a box for the pump. We connected the two with rubber, and voila! You’ve got a water garden, pond, or whatever you might call it. They were undoubtedly innovators. Their easy-to-understand and install systems created the pond industry as we know it today, and many are still installing their systems and others just like them.
With this new easy to install system on the market and Aquascapes sending out catalogs to every landscaper out there that described their “build a pond in a day process,” we ended up with many landscapers and homeowners trying their hand at pond building.
Maybe it’s Not So Simple.
Over time, the initial enthusiasm wore off, and the vast majority of these landscapers decided that these ponds weren’t that simple and the clients weren’t that happy. The system was a great idea, and it brought ponds into the backyards of so many houses that wouldn’t otherwise have a pond, so for this, I am grateful.
We fell in love with ponds on the day that we plugged in the pump on our first installation. The sights and sounds of a waterfall crashing into a beautiful pond full of water lilies and fish just can’t be beat. Landscaping is fun and creative work, but there is nothing that rivals bringing a natural eco-system pond into someone’s backyard.
Just because your pond is older is not a reason to renovate it. If it is big enough for your needs, it fits your yard, and the mechanicals are still functioning, then why fix it. I’m not suggesting all old ponds need a makeover, quite the contrary. If the pond is great, other than a few minor details, then we can fix those couple of leaks and fix those rocks falling into the water, get that waterfall looking right again and thin out your plants for much less than the above price. I am happy to take the easy route if that’s what your pond needs.
Here is the pond before rejuvenation. Here is the same pond after rejuvenation.
Thinking Outside of the Box
On the other hand, if you are tired of cleaning out baskets full of leaves, you are tired of washing out filter mats, and storing your pump in the basement over winter, then we can help. Over the years, after cleaning and building many, many ponds, we have come to the realization that there are better ways to do things if you think a bit outside of the “box.”
The skimmer box idea probably came from the pool industry, where you have a sterile, plant-free environment, and you simply need to skim a little debris from time to time. For this, it is well suited, but for a pond, it’s a bit ridiculous. With a pond full of plants, you might only be skimming a few square feet in from of the skimmer door, and the leaves that you pull from your pond, while enough to clog that net and starve your pump of water, are not really significant when compared to the eco-system as a whole.
The other disadvantage of the skimmer box, which anyone who has one can tell you, is that it is only taking water from the very top layer of the pond, so if your water level drops by an inch or two, once again, your pump is being starved of water. It didn’t take us long to realize that when a homeowner got home from work in the evening, they weren’t at all pleased with the sound of their expensive pond pump chugging and gurgling due to a lack of water.
Add to this the fact that putting a pump in a shallow plastic box with a plastic lid seems to give us a lot more pump noise than we wanted while sitting near our pond and that this box made it necessary for us to take our pump out and store it in a bucket of water in our basement for the winter. We just figured there had to be a better way.
New Ways
This drove us to create our wet well intake system that we install now. The new system eliminates the need to remove the pump for the winter, eliminates all filters and nets to clean, eliminates the pump getting starved of water, and eliminates most if not all of the pump noise.
If you are the type of pond owner who likes all of the aspects mentioned above of skimmer boxes, our system is not for you, and we can install a skimmer box for you. But, if you are like the vast majority of our clients who enjoy sitting by the pond and enjoying the pond more than they like maintaining it, I think you will really love the new system.
The waterfall box was never as troublesome as the skimmer box, but it did provide us with media bags and filter material to clean, and it did tend to rise out of the ground over the years. Since an up-flow wetland filter is a much more efficient filter, gives us much more room for aquatic plants, eliminates all filter cleaning, and we don’t need to look at that plastic box sticking out of the ground, it was a very easy choice.
This was the pool, before we turned it into the pond at the top.
What You and Your Pond Need
Not all ponds need a complete renovation, but most of them that have been in the ground for more than a few years could use a bit of tender loving care. Even if you are just curious to know the possibilities, give us a call, text, or email, and I will be more than happy to come out and talk with you about your pond. I will give you my honest opinion of the state of your pond, and I can tell you what I would do differently. I’m not here to tell you what to do; I am here to help you enjoy your pond. We have seen it all and can do it all. We’ve serviced and built all types of systems, so I’m sure we can help you and your pond.