Koi Pond Project - Finished

[samsisson]

I figured I should document my pond project from last year in case anyone could use what I’ve done for their yard We had the perfect spot for a waterfall/koi pond next to some concrete stairs in our backyard.

Moving the “dirt” (clay/petrified rock) was a pain, so it took several days with a pickaxe to finish it.
Pay close attention to that white spot. I’m still not sure what it was. It was a softer rock; maybe limestone or something.
More digging. All this time I was taking wheelbarrow loads up that dirt path that you can barely see on the right to dump them.


I used some cinder caps to visualize how high the waterfalls would be before I started laying anything down permanently.

Here I finally removed all of the dirt pile that came from up top so I could start digging the main section of the pond (where the fish will be). This was the hardest rock, so we ended up renting a 12” auger to loosen up the majority of it
This is after tidying up the edges, and adding more caps for visualization of the heights.

 

[samsisson]

I finally got to laying down the cinder blocks. I went with half blocks so that I could get a more natural shape. My goal for the bottom was to raise the water line up as much as possible, so that when I sat next to the water the fish would be closer

I thought about keeping this boulder in place, but I figured it would make the cinder blocks stronger if I had them connect back to themselves. It worked out, because this rock looked really good somewhere else later on.

 

[samsisson]

Laying the blocks was slow moving, because I wanted each one to be level side to side and front to back. It really paid off though when I added some flagstone pieces on the tops later.

 

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Finally getting to the waterfalls

The finished block work

 

[samsisson]

A quick thing to note before showing this next part is that I poured a slab of concrete in the bottom of the lowest section so I could float it completely flat, and then I got a load of sand to put on top of the concrete for protection against holes

 

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In the middle section I just used gravel, and the leftover mortar from the masonry work to make the floor; I added the sand on top of that as well.

 

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In the top of the pictures you can see the fabric underlayment that serves as a barrier between the blocks and the firestone liners.

Here are all of the chambers filled up with the pump running. The whole system is about 1,200 gallons!

 

[samsisson]

It was fun to have a pool for a while

 

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This is some of the flagstone that I was choosing from for this project. The last picture is all of it laid out on our hill so they wouldn’t kill the grass

This is where the fun begins

 

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Already started to get some visitors

I made some faux wood boxes out of some pvc board that I spray painted (and ended up flex sealing later when the paint started to chip). They turned out pretty nice!

This is a “car port” made out of pvc pipe with a flagstone top to give the fish somewhere to hide. They LOVE this thing

 

[samsisson]

Rock work is mostly finished
King of the pond
Here he is again on the weir, which is just a black brute trashcan with holes drilled in the lid, and filled with pea gravel to weigh it down it works surprisingly well, and isn’t an eyesore with the flagstone over the top of it

I made him a ramp so he could get out (he was there for a couple weeks and it was starting to worry me)
The fence around the weir is just eggcrate that’s zip tied together. I had little goldfish in it at this point, and this kept them from flopping onto the top of it (no fish were harmed in the making of this pond )

Added some lights so we could appreciate it at night

 

[samsisson]

These are about the size of all of the fish that we added. They grew fast!
The big koi in these pictures were the same size as the yellows in the previous pictures when we got them, and this was just a few months after that! (Still almost a year ago) they’re huge now! I’ll have to get some more recent pictures of all of our fish and post them here

 

[sharis100]

Wow, beautiful!

 

[samsisson]

I used a 5 gallon bucket filled with some filter floss and sponges and some lava rock around it in the highest chamber, and then added pond beneficial bacteria way before adding any fish. I also run a huge jebao uv sterilizer in the return line. The project was super fun and only cost maybe $1.5-2k (mainly in the rock and liners). Let me know if you have any questions and I’ll gladly answer them!

 

[samsisson]

Wow, beautiful!

Thanks so much

 

[york1]

Nice work! Kinda makes me want a koi pond but I am way to lazy to take on a project like that

 

[samsisson]

Nice work! Kinda makes me want a koi pond but I am way to lazy to take on a project like that

I can 100% understand that. It would take some convincing for me to work on another but the outcome made the manual labor worth it!

 

[1mbrews8]

love it!

 

[Rainblood]

great job, looks fantastic

 

[samsisson]

love it!

great job, looks fantastic

Thanks a lot guys! I appreciate it