How can I make this look better?

[NancyMc]

My whole pond is pictured in my profile picture. However, as beautiful as it is I am not happy with how this mass of rock looks and think there has to be some brilliant idea out there on how to improve the appearance - creative person out there?

 

[Priscilla]

Wow! That is a load of rocks! I tried to pull up your profile picture but its only a small picture so I can't get a good look at your pond over all.

I don't know what's under those rocks, but can you just take a lot of them away and replace with plants? If water flows through there maybe some sort of bog with pea gravel, if water only flows through the middle down the waterfall, then some soil and lot of plants to soften the look.

There's nothing wrong with the rocks, but I can see why you'd like to soften the look. Trailing plants are always good for that.

Please let us know what you decide to do.

 

[Waterbug]

Plants solve all issues.

A more involved option is to remove all the rock and then rebuild mortaring the rock in place. That gives you control. Loose rock moves over time. A lot of DIYers don't want to use mortar for many reasons. They think it takes a lot of skill, or believe myths about being toxic in a pond or freezing. Instead they want to use glues, foam, goops. That's really unfortunate because mortar is by far the easiest way (assuming a good result is the goal), cheapest, best lasting method. It's why professionals don't use goops. Yes, many pond builders do use foam, but to me getting money for something doesn't make them professionals.

If you go with mortar the trick to a natural look is to not have any visible mortar. Use really thin mortar beds. You're not really trying to glue then together, you're just filling the uneven gap between rocks. That's exactly how a dry stacked wall is made except they use small rocks instead of mortar. Mortar is way faster and works great. You do still need to do what dry stacked stone wall builders do, fine just the right rock for each space. So it's not like laying bricks, just using the next closest rock.

Another nice thing about mortar is should you ever want a new pond the rocks can be removed with a few taps, the mortar cleaned off a little and the rocks reused. Goops can be a huge pain to remove.

 

[brokensword]

Well, not sure I can help per se, but the first thing I noticed is you have 4 different styles/kinds of stone; cut concrete (container/perimeter), finished stone (limestone? caps), lots of ledged/shale stone (falls volume), and some fieldstone(boulders). Were it my design, I'd have opted for one style and made it look more 'natural'. That is, you wouldn't see this type of 'spill' in nature. You have natural combined with man-made and I find the look incongruous.

So, perhaps put in more field stone and work a FEW pieces into 'shelves' for your waterfall? Not much you can do about the man-made portions unless you re-do the entire pond edge/container and that looks like a lot of work. I have something similar to what I described; falls is basically fieldstone boulders piled up with some few pieces of ledgestone worked into it as shelves, with boulder/fieldstones then continuing around as my perimeter. But I don't have a 'container' as you do, mine is just an edging for effect to cover the liner as my pond is in-ground and not raised.

JMHO

Michael

 

[Fishylove]

I am assuming that this is a waterfall? I think both ideas can incorporated. Maybe use mortar to form your waterfall to keep anything from moving. I chose to dry stack, but as water bug said, they will settle and move over time. Then maybe form tiers for planting alongside the falls. And if you have them, rounded stones would help to soften the flatness too. Good luck

 

[koshki]

It seems like you are locked in to the number of rocks because of the size of your retaining wall. And it's difficult to see where your waterfall runs and what would get wet. But I would make use of the steps on the wall by putting lots of potted plants on there. Something with "spillers" that will drape down into the rocks would be pretty.

Also, if the left side is that shady throughout the day, you could put some ferns in pots on some of the rocks that get wet. I put one on my falls last year, and it went crazy with growth. There are all sorts of interesting ferns in different sizes that would look nice.

Personally, I'd go a bit crazy with all that space for potted plants. Maybe you could carve out some space within the rock fall for other plants.

 

[Tula]

If this were my pond, I'd remove some of the rocks and evaluate if I needed the height of the retaining wall. I'd use Creeping Jenny to spill over the rocks and lots of pretty planters

 

[sissy]

phlox would look good also tuck nice pots of plants in the rocks .Just remove a few rocks and tuck a plant here and a plant there .Hosta a liriope and lemon grass .

 

[addy1]

Plants would help a lot like said above, also some pieces of drift wood, logs etc.

 

[j.w]

Yes it looks like too many rocks to me. Take a bunch off and add plants. Do a trial water flow down it and see how it looks running. You can rearrange the rocks while the water flows to get the look you want. You will get wet

 

[Shdwdrgn]

I see you have a sort of spillway down the center, but the rest of it just looks like the slate was dumped there. Try to organize it more into various steps that are made of multiple layers of slate. Keep the flat edges of the slate facing outward so your steps appear as flat walls. Start building from the front edge of your waterfall and move backwards. The steps will let you do a wider flow pattern across the whole area, and give you more interesting splashing across the rocks. You could also include a couple shallow pools at varying heights and drop in some grasses or mini-cattails.

Maybe try re-building it a few times and see what techniques work the best? This sort of thing is definitely better suited to cementing the slate in place, but you want some practice first before committing yourself to a final design.

Overall, the best option is to hit Google images (or another search site) and look at waterfall designs made with slate rock, find designs that can fit your area, and use them as inspiration.

 

[NancyMc]

For brokensword - yes there are several different styles of stone/construction. Rather than incongruous, I call it eclectic.
For all of you who gave me such wonderful constructive answers, I will take them all to heart and when it I have put them in to use, I will take more photos and submit. it is going to be lots of work but worth it in the end.
Again, thank you all.

 

[Waterbug]

I like eclectic too. It's harder to pull off than all natural or all formal but you're certainly doing it.

One tiny trick I like and think works is to take a hammer and break a couple of those formal caps. Then arrange so it looks like the cap transitions to rock by mortaring rock to the cap's cracked joint. It depends on where everything lines up, can't force it. But it can look more like the natural and formal were meant to go together rather than you ran out of rocks and used cap stones instead...not saying that's what happened because clearly you have a vision. Mortar is really needed for that kind of control so I wouldn't do that with dry stacked. I'll also make a little fake rock from mortar and colors to make the transition. Just takes a tiny little bit. An entire structure of fake rock always looks fake to me. But a little fake rock mixed in with real rock can be a real fooler. Seeing a standard mortar joint is not a look I like in a waterfalls unless maybe all formal.