Pond Boss Forums POND CONSTRUCTION Selecting a site Starting a Pond in Southern California

Hey Everyone, This is my first post. I'm 21, a Film maker about to graduate from college and I have a passion for the outdoors and fishing. I have always wanted my own pond so this is what has brought me here.

I live in Southern California and will be looking at buying property in the next year or so. It seems like all of the property around where I will be thinking about (Santa Clarita Valley-Acton, Aqua Dulce, Canyon Country or IE- Riverside, Norco, Mira Loma) All have fairly sandy soil.

So it seems I will not be able to just fill it, as the soil will probably just soak up the water. So I can only think of two options, which is to use a pond liner or to do cement and cinderblock construction.

Pond liner seems the easiest to pull off by myself, but I worry that I wouldn't be able to walk on it, and I want to eventually be able to take a dip in my pond at points and enjoy it fully that way.

Cement and cinderblock seems interesting, but I imagine more expensive, and maybe more difficult to do myself as well as issues of cracking.

Are there any other options? Cost effective is key but I also can figure to do it over a lot of time. I am a long way from being able to do this, but I am very interested and want to start planning as soon as I can.


PS - If anyone in Southern California knows of places to buy fish that would be cool to know too.

Welcome to Pond Boss, Mikey! Please tell us a bit more about your cement/cinder block idea. How do the cinder blocks fit into the construction?

Also, do you know how large you want the pond to be? No matter which route you choose, size will influence cost. Liners work well but are expensive for larger ponds.

Wow, you have a big challenge ahead of you. I would start by visiting known ponds and talking to the owner/keepers in the areas you like/can afford. There were a number of housing developments that used ponds/lakes as a selling point in your area. Parks also might be a resource,also golf courses. There is a golf course near my SoCal home that has a couple of lined ponds.

Drought conditions will be a consideration, so being on a part time stream or run off channel is a thought, shade another.

Earthquakes are another thought if considering a concrete pond.

I remember looking at property in northern San Diego county where there were private ponds, Fallbrook, I think. As a kid I used to fish a small natural pond near Miramir Naval air station in San Diego county, might be another place to look.

Sorry for the random thoughts.

Good luck.

Hello Mikey and welcome to Pond Boss. My Mom's Koi pond has a plastic liner and they walk on it to clean the pond. Bruce has a pond with a liner perhaps he has some input as well.

If you go to this link for the California department of fish and game about the sixth link down is the Public Aquaculture List Report that lists fish farms by county. That will give you a good idea as to where you can get the species of fish that you are looking for.

Wow, Thanks for all the responces right away. I figured the cinder block construction would go the way that a cinder block wall would, so very steep sides, but doing it in levels. But I hadn't thought about the earthquake thing. I remember our block wall fell down in the '94 quake, I would hate to have that happen to me.

I think there are places in Southern California that would be better to go, but basically the IE is a prospect because I have a part time job as a director and editor of commercials there, which could turn into full time work, however if that doesnt happen within the next couple of months, I will be looking in more of the Santa Clarita Valley area. It seems to be the only place to get affordable land, and be under an hour (under optimal conditions mind you) to Burbank - where I have worked in the past and could easily continue to work.

I guess it would be helpful to give off the main goals of my pond. I'm really thinking long term here, as I have an idea to just stay put wherever I end up for a long long time. I have lived in the same home (when Im not at school) for 21 years, and hope to move to the next one for even longer. So basically I would like it to be a nice relaxing place to go where I could catch mostly panfish like bluegill and red ear with the occasional cat or bass. So not looking really for a trophy anything pond, just a nice recreational one.

I would also like it to have some shallow marshy areas where I could encourage frogs to stay and breed. Growing up, frog catching with my dad was some of my best memories and I would like to continue that on with my sons, Lord willing, one day.

As far as overall size. I would love to have some of the big momma's that you guys have, seriously you all make me jealous ha ha. But I could go as small as .10 acre or as large as .75 acre depending on factors related to the size and position of the property I end up buying. I thought if I had to go the way of liner, maybe I could do some smaller ponds and connect them with small shallow streams, making islands in the middle and good places for the frog catching as well as not having to have an absolutely humongous piece of liner.

Sorry I know that is all a lot to read, but hopefully as I become a permanent member of this community, I will be sharing lots of my hopes and aspirations so that we all can feel like we know one another.

howdy mikeyboy and welcome to pondboss.

w/ the number of seismic events over magnitude 3 that area can experience, i too would be skeptical about a cinder block construction. even w/ rebar, w/ any cracking would be leaking.

there are mortar type products w/ elasticizers in them. they trowel or spray on over metal meshing and are "bendable". if yer pond was really small (i.e. pool sized), that might be an option, otherwise a liner sounds more practical. you could lay sand or even soil over the liner in the areas you'd like to swim or wade around in.

good luck,

Thanks for the advice Dave. It looks like pond liner it is, I will just have to be conscious of how i support it and cover it i suppose so that I can walk on it at times.

Where is El Dorado Ca at anyway, I haven't heard of it before.

Neither has anyone else.

El Dorado (Spanish for "the golden one") is a legend that began with the story of a South American CPA who covered himself with gold dust and would dive into a lake of pure mountain water.

The legend originates in present-day Colombia, where conquistador Guiseppe Jhappo first found the Muiscas, a nation in the modern day Cundinamarca and Boyacá highlands of Colombia, in 1537. The story of Muisca rituals was brought to Quito by Sebastián de Belalcázar's men; mixed with other rumors, there arose the legend of 'El Dorado' (meaning the Golden Man rather than a place - 'el indio dorado', the golden Indian or 'El Rey Dorado', The Golden King).

Imagined as a place, El Dorado became a kingdom, an empire, the city of this legendary golden king named dave. Deluded by a similar legend, Guiseppe Jhappo and Francisco Orellana would depart from Quito in 1541 in a famous and disastrous expedition towards the Amazon Basin; as a result of this, however, Jhappo and Orellana became the first to navigate the Amazon River all the way to its mouth, but they never found dave (in el dorado).

Oh Snap...that's funny right there.

haha, nice Dave.

At the the completion of this unsuccessful quest, Jhappo uttered the now famous quote "Dave's not here, man!"

Did you say El Jhappo el quito, what, Pond Boss or accounting?

Hey, MikeyBoy!!! Glad to have you here.

I usually like to start an internet pond relationship by talking about things which I have minimal or no knowledge.

So here goes.

When I was at the Lincoln Home Builders Home and Garden Show there was a gent who was convinced of a way I could use concrete to build a pond. He had some sort of relatively inexpensive styrofoam forms that were braced together with a weird plastic matrix. He explained to me that homes were being constructed out of this stuff to keep their energy costs down. (Actually I knew this fact) But then he said that he was absolutely convinced that they could be used to create a solid pond substrate.

Weird, huh?

Again...welcome.

Now I return you to our regularly scheduled discussion from folks who actually know what they're talking about.

Funniest PB quote of 2009...but I don't know exactly why.

I thought El Dorado was a coyboy movie.

Hey guys, let's not scare MikeyBoy away the first day he posts! HAHA Break him in easy...

Ha ha. Oh trust me, I have been reading posts for a while and I know how it goes. Consider me broke. Ha ha.

Thank you Dave for a near perfect recitation of my family's history.



As homage to my family's historic past, once a year I cover myself in gold dust (well fool's gold dust, who can afford the real stuff) and dive into my pond while reciting Internal Revenue Code. It is a beautiful and sacred ritual.

It scares the hell out of the neighbors though.

MikeyBoy
Welcome to the forum hope you have a copy of the magazine and will share it with your friends the more the better.

You can put a liner and cover it with dirt and do whatever you want. It has enough give that a little shaking should not bother.

Otto

Alright, well it seems that a liner is my best option. Is there any way to combine pieces of it, i.e. to create a stream in between two smaller ponds or anything like that?

With liners you can do just about anything your imagination dictates... I built a crazy pond in my backyard when I was a teenager using liners. Had a stream connecting one pond to another bigger pond. It was a pretty cool set up. I wish I had pictures of it.

That's encouraging to hear, I thought it would be interesting to create an "island" by making two ponds with two streams connecting them, so an island with no fear of erosion.

MikeyBoy;; CJBS2003 hit the nail on the head you are only limited to what you can dream.. Go for it.

Gee,could you guys elaborate on that a little? I dream of doubling the size and depth of my pond,but I ran into one little problem and one big problem and I cant figure out how to overcome either.
The little problem is my little bank account.
And the big problem is my wife.