Water Features: A Natural Expression of Nature

I am blogging about a subject that is near and dear to my heart. About 20 years ago I fell in love with the idea of building water features into the landscapes of the homes that I had the pleasure and honor to design and implement. This quickly became a passion; I found that the water features brought the landscape to life. What I mean by this is when you put moving water in the midst of your landscape, it brings it to life. Who hasn’t been captivated by the sounds of a babbling brook, moving stream, a waterfall while out on a hike in the canyons or mountains. It only stands to reason that having something like a water feature in the midst of your landscape brings those experiences generally only found in nature to your home.

I have over the years seen them made in several ways. Some designers will basically create a pool, not as deep or wide, with concrete and rocks to resemble a pond found in nature. They will then place a pump in the bottom covered by rocks to create the circulation necessary to move water which of course will help with clarity and sound. Often they will extend the concrete and rocks to create a waterfall so that the volume of sound increases and the visual impact is greater. I maintain water features like these and though they are effective and can be visually attractive, often times you can see that they are concrete which diminishes the natural look. The care for this type of water feature can be more difficult to keep clear and clean. In the construction of this type of water feature, a liner has to be used under the concrete to create a non-leaking membrane because of the nature of concrete itself to expand and contract it can and will crack leading to leaks. I bring up the use of a liner because it has become the single most effective way to build a natural water feature.

The best way to build a water feature in any environment involves using only the rubber liner (EPDM) or a polypropylene liner along with all the rocks, boulders, gravel, sand and plants that you want to use to create a totally natural water feature. The difference between the two above mentioned liners is that the EPDM liner is soft and supple and easier to work with for smaller residential water features. These types of water features when properly built have all the strength and function of a stream or waterfall you would come across in nature. Rocks and boulders can be hand placed in a sense puzzled together to lock them into place making it easy to walk on or even get into the water feature as you would a river or stream. These water environments are easier to set up proper filtration and circulation which aides in the clarity and ease of maintenance. It is rather awesome to see it in action and experience the relaxing sounds. The sounds of a water feature can block out the sounds of a highway, motorcycles and cars. Everything about these systems are designed to react together to create an eco-system that works together for the benefit of plants and fish.

There are several types of water features that can be implemented into a landscape; you can have a pond, a pond with a waterfall, a pond-less waterfall, bubbling rocks and streams. The choices allow for flexibility and peace of mind regarding where and how the water feature is placed in your environment. With any of these choices there are several additional items that add to the ease of maintenance and care you have to put into them. Water features can be installed with over-flow protection, automatic fill valves and easy to clean filters which makes your water feature trouble free. Let us look at each of these facets. All of these items are important to have for various reasons; the over-flow protection will allow the water feature to release water in a low impact way in the event water from any source like rain and irrigation system (sprinkler) failure that might allow more in than is necessary for the operation of the water feature. The geography of our area has a lot of elevation changes, which is perfect for the design and placement of a water feature, but because of this sometimes water shed from rains drain down yards and could be captured by the water feature and then disbursed in a low impact way. With the addition of an automatic fill set in the water feature it will protect the feature from becoming too low to operate. Whether you have just a pond or a waterfall or both it can lose water through transpo-evaporation. Whenever water is exposed to air this process will happen. The daily loss is so minimal that is not detrimental to environment or to the thought of water conservation, however over a period of a few weeks it can allow the water feature to get too low to operate. The automatic fill valve will allow the home owner to enjoy the water feature without having to drag a hose over to it to fill it up. Finally, the installation of easy to clean filters allow for the water feature to properly filter itself and makes the water feature virtually maintenance free. I have worked with and installed these filter systems for about 20 years and the result is the same, the filters can be easily removed from the water feature quarterly, rinsed out with a hose and placed back in to provide maintenance free care.

Once the water feature has been designed and tested to make sure all areas are working correctly, items like fish, plants, bridges, statues and lighting or any other personal effects can be added to make the water feature exactly what you envisioned. Water features will bring an amazing amount of life and personality to your environment and landscape, they are easy to have fun with and enjoy.