SANDY SOIL_WALLS CAVING IN

[Stephanie D]

HELP! My husband is ready to kill me. He has been working on this pond for over two weeks. We have very sandy soil. The walls started caving in. Will they STOP caving in with the water in it? The pond is the size of a large kiddy pool- my daughter can stand in it and it goes to her chin. After googling this problem, I found that we probably should have built "shelves" but no tutorial that I watched ever mentioned the need for shelves!

If he has to drain this again he's going to lose his mind. Can I tell him that what has settled is most likely done settling?

 

[Lisak1]

Welcome @Stephanie D ! Sorry that you are joining us with a problem, but that's not really all that unusual.

First, I can't imagine what pond tutorials you've been watching that don't mention adding shelves to your pond - check out The Ponddigger on YouTube for some of the best information out there.

Second - no one can say for sure whether your walls are done collapsing. You may want to consult with some people who dig for a living - say cement people who pour foundations - and see what their experience tends to be. It may be that you can't build a pond without some kind of structural foundation. Not my area of expertise though.

 

[GBBUDD]

Ok is your daughter 2 and two feet tall or is she 20 and and your kiddie pool is five feet deep? is hubby handy can he work with concrete and cinder blocks
here' s my post shelves footings and cinder block walls. https://www.gardenpondforum.com/threads/going-for-it-phase-one-12-000-gallon-pond.22563/
here is the pond digger

A picture is worth a thousand words do you have a few photos

https://www.youtube.com/watch?annot...&feature=iv&src_vid=SMI1p1WKXy8&v=KGld3MyMgzU

 

[myswtsins]

Definitely need some more info about the size of this pond a kiddie pool and a daughter of unknown height is not enough to go off of lol. Pictures will help a lot here. I have sandy soil too and no selves other than the rock border shelf. 3ft deep with slightly angled sides and a very little bit of concrete place around the collar under the rocks. No issues so far but that my experience with MY soil.

 

[warren]

I had similar soil so I dug my hole larger than I wanted and built a wall made of landscaping timber. I back filled around it . I padded it with old carpet than lined it with pond under liner than put a good thick pond liner in. The timber lasted 20 + years before I needed to replace it. I only replaced it because I was adding new shelves and replacing liner. It also allowed it to be part in the ground and part above. The water fall is the same construction. I just hid the landscaping timber with my rock work.Pardon the disarray I’m making more renovations.