tree roots when laying a liner

[wayne sandland]

hi everyone my wife made the mistake of saying i can build a bigger pond so within 5min i was digging so she could'nt change her mind i only dug the top at the moment ist 8ft x 14ft and want to go down about 4ft but there is a tree ether end of the pond as i have no where else to put it i have to make do my concern is when i have dug down and lay my liner will the roots i have cut or new roots rip and damage my liner.
thanks'

 

[addy1]

Some trees have water seeking roots, i.e. will go through anything to find water. Other will stop at a barrier.

You might want to ask a nursery about the type of trees you have. You can put extra underlayment between the liner and the roots to protect the liner. This is just guessing, but if you are concerned about the roots growing into your liner, you could put some concrete, concrete blocks something of that sort outside of the liner in the hole, to make it harder for the roots to grow towards your pond and pond liner.

My pond is near 3 mature trees, but the roots I dug up where small, I was far enough from the trees to not be concerned about root damage.

 

[taherrmann4]

Wayne,
Smart move at getting started right of way before she could change her mind. :razz: Now onto your roots question, I will speak about my experience that I have with them. I have two trees within feet of my pond one is about 20' tall and has lots of roots that seek out water (river birch), the other is a dawn redwood which is about 30' tall and has some very large roots that spread out and are quite large about 3-4' out. Neither one of these trees have been a problem for my pond, they have not pushed up or through the liner but rather seem to go around or under the pond, and most tree roots grow within 6"-24" of the soil. I have a thick woven underlayment then my liner on top of that. There are different types of underlayment, I owuld get a good geotextile underlayment, the one I installed is rather thick and heavy but worth the extra cost IMO. I have seen where roots have not been able to penetrate this fabric; when I was doing some minor repairs on my landscape lighting I had to take up some of the rocks along the side of the pond and saw that some of the shallow roots had grown OVER the fabric and were growing between the liner and underlayment but the small roots were unable to penetrate through the fabric.

Like Addy says it depends a lot on the type of trees you have as well.