Pond Boss Forums POND CONSTRUCTION Renovating a Pond or Lake? Stone around pond good or bad?

Thinking about adding stone all the way around pond. Any suggestions. Already placed river stone in some parts? Pros , cons on doing this?

I did mine all the way around and had to hand place over 50% of it.
Pro: It looks good and serves as silt screen while adding some lime to the water.
Con: It's back breaking labor if pond won't allow you close with a loader.

I have it 100% around the small pond and all along the levee on the large one.

X2 on the back breaking part....the levee of the large pond was 100% hand placed, all 150 yards of it.

I'd recommend a good landscape cloth under it if I were you...I did that on the large pond and it's really slowed down the weeds as well as kept the rocks from disappearing.

It's also a decent deterrent to muskrats, or at least it seems like it is. You'd need to go some distance below the water level for this benefit though.

It also looks good, at least for a while.

What kind of stone is it? And did you put anything underneath and do weeds grow they it! Looks awesome

I used the big limestone. I think 6-8. I did not use any fabric under them, it would have taken me another week. This is my first spring and I can see I will probably need to spray them if I want them weed free.

FWIW I used the smaller 4 to 6 inch around mine and put landscape fabric under it. So far, minimal weeds. This summer will be the test I suspect. I doubt you can prevent weeds forever as silt washes in from the water shed in between the stones eventually.

My pond is a lined pond and the liner is probably 100 times thicker than any landscaping fabric. I have the 4-6 stone 3-4 feet down into my pond surrounding 90 percent of it and I still get weeds. You will be spraying no matter what you do if you want to keep your pond edges weed free.

Where did you get the rope ? I used telephone poles on my dock and want to install rope.

You can pick up that rope on Amazon, at a local Home Depot, or a local Army surplus store.

Home Depot Rope

Amazon Manilla Rope

On an existing pond would you drain the pond down prior to doing this or just get wet and muddy putting it in?

In addition to the above good advice, the larger the stone is the longer it takes to get covered with silt and dead organics. As the silt layer develops, it allows more weed growth. Larger stone also provides more habitat in terms of hiding places for invertebrates, esp crayfish, and fish. Invertebrates live on and in the attached growth of the rocks, micro-habitat. Broken concrete in hand movable chunks from construction projects works good along one side of the pond. I like broken cement sidewalk chunks. Contact cement contractors to see if they have a waste disposal site where you can get it for free. Be aware that limestone based rocks will sometimes grow more attached algae due to calcium phosphate dissolving form the limestone.

Depending on what you rely on for water to fill the pond, it could be both.

While it wasn't too grass friendly, last pond I did was with a tri-axle dump truck and an excavator (track hoe). Excavator dug the rip=rap out of the dump truck and placed it on the pond bank, both in and out of the water, depending on what pond and the water level in that pond.

That definitely sounds like the least back breaking way of doing it but would need to wait for summertime dry weather or would be a mess for sure.

Thinking about having a smaller track back this summer to straighten out a bank line any ways will talk with my equipment guys while they are here about it.

You might want to talk to them now because in the mean time they my be able to locate you broken concrete.