What equipment is needed for a pond?

What tools will l need to build a pond?

This will partly depend, of course, on the style and size of the proposed pond, but the following will be useful. In the first instance, you will need a hammer, pegs and string to mark out the outline of the pool. To get the levels correct you will need a long piece of wood and a spirit level. If you do not have a spirit level a water level can be used or, if you can find one, a translucent garden hose. The next problem is digging the pond. A spade will suffice for a small pond, but a mechanical digger will make life easier for anything larger. Small self drive diggers can be hired and you can even get one with a driver. You will need some means of getting rid of the spoil, which will at least mean a wheelbarrow, but you may also have to hire a waste disposal skip to have it taken from your garden. A shovel will be useful for removing loose soil as well as for moving sand and mixing concrete. A garden rake will be needed for levelling the ground and removing stones. If any block work is involved you will need a bricklayer's trowel as well as buckets for carrying cement. Sharp scissors or a sharp knife will be needed for cutting liners and underlay.

Tools and equipment

You will need some or all of the following to build a pond of any size. The items marked with an asterisk (*) will be needed for a large pond.

• Bricklayer's trowel
• Buckets
• Fork
• Garden hose
• Garden rake
• Hammer
• Mechanical digger*
• Pegs
• Scissors or a knife
• Shovel
• Skip*
• Soil compactor*
• Spade
• Spirit level
• Straight edge
• String
• Water level*
• Wheelbarrow

Is it better to buy or hire the tools?

You will probably already have many of the tools if you have a garden, and if you are just starting out you will need to buy some of them anyway. Basic items, such as spades, will be essential garden tools, and most gardeners will also have general tools, such as hammers and spirit levels. The one major item that will need to be hired is a mechanical digger, although if you have a very large garden and are planning a very big pond it might be economical to buy a second hand one at a farm sale and sell it after you have finished the pond and completed any landscaping you want to do. Most gardeners, however, will find that a small digger, hired with or without an operator, will be more than sufficient. Occasionally you may need to compact the soil, and it is easier to hire a mechanical soil compactor than to do it by hand. The only other tools that you may need to hire are wheelbarrows. Most gardeners have at least one, but if there are several people helping you to get the pond dug, hiring extra barrows will make sense.