In that case, I would go for fairly gentle plants.
Hi Zo - how fab that you are wanting to make your pond into a wildlife pond. Any water is a great asset in a garden. You will definitely need some oxygenators for below the surface and then some marginals like the forget me nots. Watercress is actually good at keeping the water clear but it can grow very fast so you just need to keep removing some. Personally I would always choose native pond plants - purely because our native insects have evolved with them.
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There’s no such thing as an ‘ideal’ pond, I reckon. Stuff will often arrive by itself, and that’s part of the interest. You can read some of the “dont’s” above: I can heartily concur with the comments on Flag Iris - which we inherited. An escape ramp is always good (untreated wood with a stone to hold it down: it will rot but is easily replaced). Water Soldier is best avoided - unless you’re specifically hoping for Norfolk Hawkers - that’s also aggressive.
In my case, Marsh Cinqfoil is about the only species I have introduced. I didn’t expect it to thrive, but it has; without having world domination plans.
Duckweed is a nuisance, but you can spend a relaxing half-hour (we use an old kitchen colander) thinning it out once a month or so - it gives you chance to see what else is in there. Leave any ‘dredgings’ by the edge, so that any by-catch has a chance to hop back in. Frogbit has similar habits, but (to me) is much more attractive, though Duckweed might attract Small China-mark (Cataclysta lemnata) moths, which is no bad thing.
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Looking at the pond pictures I see you have used local cotswold stone. This is alkaline so that might also have an affect on the pond, perhaps you will have lots of snails for example.
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Thats interesting cause there is lots of snails on the stones and some acidently fall in When it was a fish pond when making the pond we looked for stones im not far from the Cotswold hills and Stroud in Gloucestershire and can see them from my window particularly edge and Haresfield beacon which I visit sometimes. I got a few stones from kingsway but most of them were from Stroud or near Stroud rather than kingsway which might exsplain why it’s Cotswold stone. Since it is common in the Cotswolds. When done the stones a load of beetles ran across the ground to the stones all the way from the other side of the garden and hid. They were big black ones that resembled stag beetles. Then someone gave me 2 plants for my fish pond and lent me some of her tadpoles to start the pond off so I can have some frogs since iv never ever really got to see frogs in a pond even though they can be found in them and have never had my own pond before. I fed the fish and did have frogs from the tadpoles and had them again the year after there was 3 of them and they stayed until mid to late October then the year after there was only one or 2 and around that time the fish passed away but I have them for years in a fish tank before that. Then this year iv decided to turn it into a wildlife pond but the frogs are gone and so are the beetles that were there
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I don’t know weather the person should have given me the tadpoles it gave me the opportunity to have frogs in my pond but I didn’t know that you shouldn’t really do that someone also gave me plants for my pond but I didn’t know what they were and neither did they bees and Hoverflys liked them but I didn’t know if they were native or not. Its only recently I found out it’s advised not to take pond plants from other People for your pond or for other people to bring pond plants from there pond to yours. But iv bought native watercress which I know are native and bee friendly
I don’t know what happened with The beetles but for the frogs firstly it could of had something to do with the over 30 heatwave last year and then it could also be cause the duckweed took over luckily iv removed most of it I think I need to add more things to the pond rather than just plants cause iv only got mimics and other insects diving for a dip on the surface and having fun then flying back up into the air and leaving and only have water slaters, wood lice and snails now so need to either add more things or do some things to attract more wildlife than I have now since I want to turn it into a wildlife pond natives are one way to go of course. I do have a problom with the stones though a few people sometimes bring there dog cause they can’t leave it at there house but the dogs acidently knock them over so im trying to figure out what to do about that since if they keep getting knocked in I will have to keep taking them out and I found some mud in the pond but at the moment Im mainly focused on attracting as much Wildlife as I can
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I get dragonflies in my garden in summer - really big ones sometimes - even though the ponds are next door.
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I get a dragonfly in the garden every summer but it doesn’t patrol the pond or use the pond it patrols the garden and then perches on the washing line for long periods of time so it seems to be its favourite place every dragonfly that visits has done the same thing every year
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I acidently bought a non native. I thought it was native cause it was in the native section it says it’s plant for pollinators and award of garden merit but it says it can be invasive i don’t know what to do about that cause I used my money on it and I don’t want an invasive non native plant in my pond but at the same time If it’s not in the pond it could die and I don’t want to do that cause that would be my money. they had sold out of the forget me not and I’m thinking of going back to see if they have any in again next time do you think I should take it back when I go again next time?
It’s a steep learning curve.
I can only speak from my own experience.
We started off by bringing one bucket of water in from a nearby stream. The abundance and variety of wildlife since then has been amazing.
We’ve had several species of Odonata, several of them breeding. I think you’ll find that your pond will attract common darter, azure damselfly, blue-tailed damselfy and large red damselfly once you’ve got some vegetative cover over some of the water. We also get the two demoiselles, southern hawker and the occasional ‘exotic’ (brilliant emerald) etc but they may need a rather bigger pond.
We have been invaded by marsh frogs but still get toads, common frogs and newts. Things like pond beetles just arrive by themselves.
Unless you do something really disastrous, I’m sure you’ll get a good variety of animals.
PS Marsh marigolds look lovely around the pond at this time of year.
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Ok. I havnt got any water from a nearby stream there is a stream the road but it’s a brook. There is a big massive pond on the way to the brook but it is very deep. I did look for water forget me not and they had sold out I was also thinking of getting marsh marigolds cause they have some there but they sold out of both of those so I decided to look for something else and get the water forget me not next time if they have any in. So I got the creeping Jenny They do have bull rushes and was thinking about weather to add it to the pond or not but I don’t know if it’s a good idea to add it to a small pond or not
NO to bulrush - it will completely swamp the pond!!
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Stace writes of Lysimachia nummularia “Native; damp places, often in shade; through most of (Britain and Ireland) (north) to (Central Scotland), but a naturalised garden escape in many localities, specially in (the north)” (abbreviations expanded).
A local nature reserve has planted Fritillaria meleagris, which I’m looking slightly askance at it (it’s native to flood meadows in the south), but the site is a former landfill, which has a fair number of non-native plants anyway - I assisted in a purge of hybrid bluebells last week. There are quite a few plants that I think only occur locally because of conservation plantings, such as grass vetchling.
Il only stick with The Water forget me not and marsh marigold then rather than thinking about weather I should get bulrush aswell if it would take over the pond
We have Ranunculus aquatilis which I love but it might be too much for your pond. (Water crow-foot, I think it is called).
The Floras call it (Ranunculus aquatilis) common water crowfoot. (About 2/3rds of the British crowfoot species have water crowfoot as part of their name.)
Don’t know what happened to my last effort. I was trying to upload a pic of our garden pond, taken today in rather dull light.
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Thats a nice pond. It’s not as wide as mine but it is longer
You might like to keep an eye on the new Sub-habitat project, Zo. See: