We sold our retail pond store  after 13 years in Michigan and were moving south to North Carolina!  The above picture is my finished pond when we arrived in North Carolina. Because I was bringing my favorite fish with me from Michigan I needed to have the pond all ready so we contracted to have the pond dug while we were still in Michigan. Rich and I designed the pond and we found what we thought was a reputable pond builder. Oh boy! what a mistake that was. The total lower pond totally collapsed about 6 weeks after we got here. Seems during construction the lower pond was filling with water and they chose to ignore that fact and built the pond as planned. Duh! So much for a professional that should known a hole that fills with water during construction is a problem.  By ignoring that fact the first major rain that hit collapsed the lower pond by hydrostatic pressure.

 
As I walked out to the pond early in the morning with coffee in hand as I do every morning I could not believe my eyes.  I thought I must be dreaming as I screamed for Rich. In this picture you can see where the rocks began to slide.  By mid afternoon the whole back side of the pond had collapsed in on itself.

 You can see where later that day the opposite side of the pond collapsed too. In this mess are 9 fish I moved 800 miles from Michigan to North Carolina.  Fish that I have had for many years.   I looked at the pond and wondered where my fish were. The pump actually continued to pump until we shut it off.  But as it pumped, it pumped red North Carolina red clay through the water. We had no idea if the fish were alive or buried under the massive rocks.

Because of the grade a retainer wall was built all around the pond and a French drain was added

You can see now how the retainer wall was built behind the back edge of the lower pond.

The lower pond was enlarged by nature because when the pond wall collapsed it also tore the liner in several spots.  A new liner 50 x 50 had to be bought.  Once the old liner was out we had 3 days of heavy rain that enlarged the pond! So in the end the lower pond is now about 1/3 bigger than the original design. 

Now in retrospect I wished I had gone and looked at the ponds they had built because my pond was full of flaws that one can not see but will notice once the water is actually moving through the system. The flaws in other ponds they had built were not visible in photos we looked at.  Now 18 months later we have corrected the most obvious flaws ourselves but there are some we must live with as they are beyond correction without a greatly added expense on our part. I could not see the flaws in the pictures that the contractor emailed us to Michigan as the construction was being done.

It was indeed an expensive lesson for us. Know your pond builder. Go and talk to the owners of ponds they have built. Scrutinize their work and ask lots of question. Learn from our lessons.

Now in retrospect I wished I had gone and looked at the ponds they had built because my pond was full of flaws that one can not see but will notice once the water is actually moving through the system. The flaws in other ponds they had built were not visible in photos we looked at. 

Now 18 months later we have corrected the most obvious flaws ourselves but there are some we must live with as they are beyond correction without a greatly added expense on our part. I could not see the flaws in the pictures that the contractor emailed us to Michigan as the construction was being done. It was indeed an expensive lesson for us.

Know your pond builder. Go and talk to the owners of ponds they have built. Scrutinize their work and ask lots of question. Learn from our lessons.

This is the upper pond in the summer of 2001.  The small fish you may be able to see are fry we hatched in a stock tank and then put in the upper pond to grow. The sign is at the entrance to our back yard and the upper pond is just beyond the sign and the Holly tree.

The upper pond falls down a waterfalls  that leads to a 30’ stream bed that has a wooden bridge that crosses over to the deck. Rich and I designed the unique wood deck so that the deck sits in the middle of all 3 ponds.

Iris line the sides of the stream bed that the wooden bridge goes over that leads to the deck. Once the Iris are done blooming I remove them and add another blooming plant so that I always have blooming plants in my waterfalls.

 Early summer Purple Loosestrife blooms in the streambed once the Iris are finished blooming

This is Sunny in the middle pond and you can see Mischief (just the tip of his red head)  grazing on the Water Celery I grow in the pond for the fish to snack on. The picture on the bottom shows Sunny grazing on the Water Celery.

 This view is from the upstairs window that shows the deck, which Rich and I designed, that surrounds the 3 ponds

The middle pond is about 4,000 gallons and has a nice plant shelf. This is the pond I can see out my kitchen windows as I work around the kitchen

You can see Lucky swimming in the middle pond

This is one of my favorite parts of the pond and it is the part that makes all the peaceful noise of water running.

The lower pond is about 10,000 gallons.  I had a problem with the fish going over the waterfalls and I now keep all the fish in the lower pond.  One of the nicest things about them being in the lower pond is that we can see them as we sit on the deck each night and eat dinner.  We love watching them doing their antics and they provide all the dinner entertainment we need.

There is an additional 1,000 gallons (we are guessing here) in the system that is in the streambed, 6 waterfalls, the underground pipes and the filter.

The lower pond has 2 bottom drains that feed to the Challenger filter. We use a 2 g.p.h. 2-speed pump to pump the water from the filter up to the upper pond. There is also a skimmer with in the lower pond that pumps to the middle pond. That pump is a 2700-gallon pump.

The middle has a skimmer that pumps 2700 g.p.h. to the upper pond. It also has a bottom drain.

The middle pond has a bottom drain also.

 My fish in their new North Carolina home