Water keeps going out of pond where stream comes into pond.

[dinm]

I had rebuilt my stream yesterday, no noticeable water loss today, but I am quite paranoid so I check the underlayment, most of the underlayment seems dry, which is quite good, but near the end of it where the pond liner and stream liner meet it seems to be quite wet.

I don't really understand how it happens, but I can only imagine it is capillary action. I am not sure whether perhaps the liner edge of the pond should be folded so it forms a higher edge. I do have geotextile as underlayment, then geotextile on top of the stream liner, I know underlayment geotextile can wick some water out but I have folded that too so the underlayment is not touching water.

Unsure on how to handle this properly, there is no leak, I turned off the pump and put some stones under the liner so that water would not go to the pond, it stayed there and I was waiting about 30 mins, no loss at all, no water movement. I get though a leak can be extremely small, but that seems not be the issue.

 

[addy1]

I had a shallow feed from one pond to the next. Water was wicking up and out. I built berms , raised the pond liner edge. Still wicked.

I ended up, cleaning, drying the two liners, added a lot of pl roofing goop , squished the liners together, no more water wicking. Dry now.

 

[dinm]

I had a shallow feed from one pond to the next. Water was wicking up and out. I built berms , raised the pond liner edge. Still wicked.

I ended up, cleaning, drying the two liners, added a lot of pl roofing goop , squished the liners together, no more water wicking. Dry now.

It's a riddle as to what to do here to be honest. I had quite a lot of overlap of the pond liner, but rebuilding the stream I removed that extra liner so now I only have a little bit left, it seems whatever I do some water is gonna creep up under the stream liner, which I think is happening here, and also pond liner may be wicking but I think less of a problem than the stream liner. Guess even gravity works against you when dealing with liner black magic. You can see, this is the pond liner, and then right side is the underlayment &liner which I pulled up. Very annoying. I also tested for a leak, but I was there for 30 minutes, watching if the water in the stream would decrease, but nope. And this seems decent amount of water so there's no way I wouldn't have noticed it.

 

[dinm]

Still dealing with this issue, very annoying I have to say. Have no idea how to fix it other than to move the liner around until it stops. I guess enough overlap where the stream liner comes in would fix it, but I have not anymore overlap than this, so I would have to seam some PVC liner to it, but that will be last resort.

 

[GBBUDD]

If you have pvc that could be your first problem . I have seen many a person come here saying their liner is leaking and it's pvc. Seaming if your just calling it the wrong name and it is epdm is very easy to do . You can even seem the seem and make it almost impossible to fail. And this can be done in a relatively small amount of time.

 

[dinm]

If you have pvc that could be your first problem . I have seen many a person come here saying their liner is leaking and it's pvc. Seaming if your just calling it the wrong name and it is epdm is very easy to do . You can even seem the seem and make it almost impossible to fail. And this can be done in a relatively small amount of time.

I have tested several times waiting about 30-40 mins, the stream holds water. Now it could be a very small leak, but I doubt it. PVC liners are very sensitive to rocks and gravel, but I have geotextile above the liner and under, so I do not think that is the issue. I would have preferred to use anything else than PVC, but nothing like that exists around where I live. EPDM would have certainly saved me much paranoia and anxiety of it leaking. And then I check for low edges too, but nothing.

The only option left being water leaving through capillary action. I've had leaks in the stream before, and it would leak half the pond in the matter of one night, now I lose less water and much slower but steady loss. The part where stream meets pond, under it the soil's extremely wet, but anywhere else around the pond that does not seem to be the case.

 

[GBBUDD]

Looking at your picture your trying to make a stream in between existing boulders or ledge that is the hardest pond build there is imo I'd rip out the pvc liner go get epdm and over size what you need to you have a foot more than you need on both sides as a minimum .

Lay the underlayment and liner than start your rock work. Forget your between ledge . Once you get your rock work to water level . I'd switch to mortar and boulders. With waterfall foam at the base.
Do not alow your underlayment to ride up over the edge it can wick water up and over the edge.
The mortar is to try to keep the water and stone from shifting and or allowing water to rise instead of falling down the falls.

Go you youtube and watch how the pros build every waterfall./ stream .There's usually a pooling area below every fall.

 

[dinm]

Looking at your picture your trying to make a stream in between existing boulders or ledge that is the hardest pond build there is imo I'd rip out the pvc liner go get epdm and over size what you need to you have a foot more than you need on both sides as a minimum .

Lay the underlayment and liner than start your rock work. Forget your between ledge . Once you get your rock work to water level . I'd switch to mortar and boulders. With waterfall foam at the base.
Do not alow your underlayment to ride up over the edge it can wick water up and over the edge.
The mortar is to try to keep the water and stone from shifting and or allowing water to rise instead of falling down the falls.

Go you youtube and watch how the pros build every waterfall./ stream .There's usually a pooling area below every fall.

I don't know what you mean, I was under the impression that this is how you do it with an existing pond, putting the stream liner on top of the pond liner. Not gonna redo this for the 4th time, gonna trial for a while until its fixed or just get rid of it. I guess I gotta have more overlap.

 

[GBBUDD]

I guess I'm not reading the photo correctly .

Yes overlap is key but that overlap needs to be in height not just length of overlap as a recent post showed they had over a foot of overlap but 3/4 was underwater.
Yes if water flow is from the stream to the pond then the pond liner is overlapped by the stream by a minimum of 6 inch imo 1 foot preferably

 

[dinm]

I guess I'm not reading the photo correctly .

Yes overlap is key but that overlap needs to be in height not just length of overlap as a recent post showed they had over a foot of overlap but 3/4 was underwater.
Yes if water flow is from the stream to the pond then the pond liner is overlapped by the stream by a minimum of 6 inch imo 1 foot preferably

I removed the big rocks an hour ago, so I can move things around. There were low edges on one side, now I am just waiting to see whether that area that is constantly wet dries or not. I am thinking that could have been part of the problem, although I've pulled liner so now it's further in the pond, should be enough overlap I think. I am just making the stream narrower so there's less pooling and less chance of water wicking somehow.

Can't believe how easy it is to mess this up. This is my 3rd time rebuilding this thing, 1st and 2nd time pierced because no geotextile, now low edges, wicking.

 

[addy1]

All part of building a pond, try, nope, do again.

 

[dinm]

The overlap is now 10" in length compared 3" before, now how will water be able to wick I have no idea, but perhaps need to raise the pond liner too.
I just have the hose now from the pump direct to stream while I test this out. I am not sure how the water would be able to wick out now, but let's see.

 

[GBBUDD]

I removed the big rocks an hour ago, so I can move things around. There were low edges on one side, now I am just waiting to see whether that area that is constantly wet dries or not. I am thinking that could have been part of the problem, although I've pulled liner so now it's further in the pond, should be enough overlap I think. I am just making the stream narrower so there's less pooling and less chance of water wicking somehow.

Can't believe how easy it is to mess this up. This is my 3rd time rebuilding this thing, 1st and 2nd time pierced because no geotextile, now low edges, wicking.

The usual problem is we don't see anyone until after they have built the pond and there's problems. THATS WHY I MADE MY BLOG SO MAYBEEEEE some would at least read that before the shovel hit the ground.

i'm no different i was digging with an excavator long before i really knew wick end was up.

 

[dinm]

I have just removed the liner again. No idea why water was still going out still, the sides of the liner were all dry. Not even sure whether its worth doing it again, seems no matter what I do water ends up wicking out. Could be punctured also somewhere since PVC is brittle, but I have no idea, to me wicking seems the most probable because I tested and it held water so any kind of extremely small leak would not cause the soil to be extremely wet and leave a trace from the liner to soil.

Don't think it's worth it to do it all over again so I may just end up burying the filter and letting it be as it was some time ago. All over again doesn't really mean much though, it's a very small stream, redoing the liner is a task that takes about 20 mins, but the leaks and wicking is where it gets funky and time consuming.

 

[GBBUDD]

I probably mentioned this before go to modern design aquascaping or team aquascapes or even oz pond. Just keep in mind they are pros and we should build with a larger margin of safety.