Are they essential? I live in an area where the water table is rarely lower than about 3' down. There are numerous drainage ponds in the area that always have water in them and I KNOW they're not lined. Does the liner have any benefits other than keeping the water in? We have a backhoe for the digging already, so the most expensive part (in both time & money) of me finally getting the pond I want is the liner. And if I don't have to buy the liner, I can afford a bigger pond :-)
Note, we also have a well already dug that we're going to put a pump on for irrigation, so we could use well water to 'top off' the pond if needed on occasion.
Question about pond liners
I am going to do a little guess work here.
My thought would be, unless you have a linner or packed bentinite, you could wind up with a rather large bog area around your pond. I am not saying it can't be done; but if your average water table is 3', you could probably dig 6' and have 3' of water in pond, in theory only.
A lot would depend on if you wanted fish in it and what kind. Cat fish would probably be fine. however something like Koi, could be a totaly different story. Just curious, how big were you thinking? If it is for a water feature it don't have to be big to enjoy. A lot would depend on how much work you wanted to create for yourself. and how it would fit into your landscape????
Hmmm. good point. I'm looking at something large enough that I can 'hide' the source (pump outlet) around a small corner and make it look as natural as possible. Fish of some kind is a requirement so that we don't donate huge quantities of blood to the local insect populations each time we visit the pond. I like koi, but I'm not fixated on them. I believe they are mostly plant eaters anyway, if I remember correctly, so something else might be better.
I'm looking at maybe a 10-15' circumference pond in some irregular shape. Large enough for my dogs to splash in & still let the fish have some place to hide (They're goldens - there's no way I'll be able to keep them out, so I'm just going to give up before I begin ;-) ) Which, of course, is another reason against the liner - I don't dare trust the flexible kind against dog claws. Maybe use cement? We have a good mason friend....
Truthfully I'm still kind of in the pre-pre-planning stage ;-) We got the house built, so that was step 1..
But my ideal is something as naturally self-sustaining as possible, with all the requisite plants, animals & circulation needed.
A pond builder once told me that a 60 mil EPDM liner could stand up to dog claws. I am skeptical. Does anyone have an opinion? Our dog is a lab, so . . . 'nuff said!
I used the very ughhhh heavy 60 mil. very heavy. Yes It has held up to a lab goin in for a dip occasionly. It has been very good obout standing up to laying rock without being real carefull. I'm not saying it will work for deer but that was one of my fears at the time I put it in.
The folds will probably be more pronounced compaired to the 45 mil. This is the 8th. year for our pond. We have had raccoons. possums, herrons and cats visiting us while we were sitting on our pattio not to mention all the different birds taking a bath or just stoping for a drink.
Whatever mil you use I would advise to use a padding of some sort. Old carpeting even. as you never know if a root may try to invade the underside of your pond. or maybe a sharp rock that was missed. I just used sand, for the bottom cushion. Don't know if I would go that heavy now that the big lot next door has been cleaned up, all the trees dozed piled and burned. and a tall fence put in.
Oh and no I don't miss the trees one bit. They were mostly Chinese elm that had taken over like a forest.
I no longer have the raccoon infestation they have for the most part moved on. They were what prompted me to put a bog on the one side with a much deeper dropoff. As I did lose several large Koi to them. I would add that if you put rock around the edge you shouldn't have a problem with your lab as it would be steping on the rocks any way.