If you haven’t chosen where you’ll be putting you pond yet, see our last post “Preparing to Install a Pond” to help you choose the best area in your yard.

Now that you’ve chosen the best area to install your pond, now it’s time to get started. I’ve attached a video that gives you a step by step guide on installing an in-ground pond. The tools you will need include a shovel, hand compactor, wheel barrel, measuring tape, level, dead blow hammer, safety glasses, string, spray paint, wood stake, and gloves. When it comes to supplies, this video uses an AB York block and AB Wall Cap. You can used different block types and build a different shaped pond than they do in this video. If you choose to do that, I’d would recommend looking for instructions that fit the type of pond you’re looking for. Once you have all the tools and supplies, clear the area around the location you’ve chosen.

With your tape measure, find the center of where the pond will be and hammer in a wood stake in that location. Next you will need to measure the string to be the length of the radius of the size of pond you desire. For this next step, you will need two people. Have one person hold the string in the center of the circle on the wood stake while the other pulls the string away from the stake. Once there is no slack in the string, put the can of spray paint near the end of the string and start walking in a circle and spraying. The next step is to make sure the sizing and location are correct. Once the blocks are in place, mark the outside of the blocks with your shovel. Once you have this outline, you can remove the blocks and start digging. Dig a 12 inch hole within this circle. The rest of the digging process is easier to watch on the video than to describe here. You’ll be digging 3 more inches where the blocks will be placed and adding sand in that area. Use a straight 2 by 4 and your level to make sure the area is flat and make adjustments where needed.

The last steps include putting in two levels of blocks to make sure they are level, remove them, add the liner, then place the blocks back in. Add water, electricity, whatever you need. Again, watch the video for more detailed instructions. They have more information on their website if you need further instruction for this type of pond: www.allenblock.com.

A night addition to your pond would be to add lighting so that you can enjoy your pond in the evening as well. We’ll add a post about lighting in the near future.