Nice weather for ducks

Sandwiched the liner between two pieces of protective fleece.

Yes, that's snow on the liner. Yes, those are Marigold washing-up gloves.

Emptied the contents of two water-butts into the pond while easing the liner into place.

Not too much excess to trim.

The online pond-liner size calculators seem to yield very inflated figures. I recommend trailing a piece of string across the longest/deepest cross section and adding 0.5m, width and length.

Some progess on a nice dry weekend

Pegs round the perimeter help check the levels.

We'll use sieved soil as a stone-free buffer between the pond liner and the rock/turf edging. Heather doing a splendid job, whilst listening to a whodunit to relieve the boredom.

Finished off the planter with some edging. Just need to top-up with compost and it'll be ready for planting.

Rocks

Thanks to Beeston FREE-recycle and the Jenkins' of Wollaton, scored some nice local sandstone rocks today. This is two car loads. Probably need two or three more loads (only half the pond needs edging), but will have to see how my back feels tomorrow!

Pond excavation

Most of the soil from the pond is so good I'm now thinking we might be able to give it away rather than dispose of in a skip.

Note also the superfluous balustrade has now been removed, so we'll actually be able to see the garden properly when sat on the decking.

Decking planter taking shape

It really is that deep! Spread all the earth under the rest of the decking. The idea is to use this hole to lose as much of the pond excavated soil as possible, to minimise the number of skips we'll need.

Pond outline

Hacking the decking