Patio Ponds and Gardens

Building A Waterfall, Spa, Hot Tub Surround, or a ‘Natural’ Stream from Rocks

You may want your waterfall or stream to look natural like a brook that just started happening in the rock gardens or your backyard. You may want a simple wall of water or a noisy six foot cascade. And you might not even have the space required for a quiet pond for goldfish.

Stones are heavy. Hire a Pro.

I can’t emphasize this anymore without shouting, but believe me you want draw your dream garden out on paper a few times and spray paint final lines on the ground before loading your first wheelbarrow load of rock for your new stream bed, waterfall, or spa.

Keep It in Scale

Many people want a huge waterfall that is as big as their pond . Others want a tiny waterfall that just trickles. Decide what you want before you start - once you’re in the process of building the waterfall - it’s too late. You’ll waste time and money on materials because you’ll end up repeating processes over and over again. Don’t build it if it wasn’t what you were looking to create.

Using a Weir

The easiest way to build a waterfall is to use a weir. A pond weir is a plastic box. It collects water that the pump has pumped into it. One side of the box is lower than the rest and has a lip on it so water will go over it and back into the pond.

These can be effective when building a waterfall. Simply elevate them above your pond, usually positioning them level in the dirt you have dug out to make your pond, put tubing from your pump into the weir. When the weir fills up, a sheet of water will fall over the weir and into your pond. Then hide the weir with rocks and plants so no one can see the plastic box

You can put your biofilter in the weir. As an aside, if you use lava rocks in your biofilter , put the rocks in several mesh bags, not just one. It takes a strong men to lift just one bag out, so use at least three bags. I usually float some hyacinths or other floating plants in the weir to further camouflage the plastic box and tubing.

Building a Natural Looking Waterfall from Rocks

Start with a semi level surface, slightly raised in the back, at the same level as your pond in front. From there, standing in the pond, build the waterfall using the same kind of rocks you used in your pond construction. Start with large, flat and thin rocks.No round rocks allowed.

Lay your first flat rocks . After you put the first large rock down on top of your liner, run water from the pump over it to make sure the water flows into the pond. If it does not, shim up the rock in the back. If you don’t start on a slight angle, water will fall off the back and drain your pond dry in a few hours.

Next, stack two or three thick and chunky rocks on each end of the bottom rock. Those rocks can be as much as 5 or 6″ thick. Make sure they are flat on two sides because you are going to build the rest of your waterfall on top of them.

Shimming must be done to keep the angle toward the pond and proper placement of rocks is most important to ensure stability of the falls.The back of the waterfall is just as important as the front. You don’t want the entire structure falling in the water during the first wind, or on someone’s foot when they walk too close to the rockpile.

Use two large thin rocks side by side on the bottom to make a wider waterfall. After you have two large flat rocks on the ground level, you need more chunky rocks to rest the second level on. Keep building and testing untill you get what you want or run out of rocks.

The easiest way to build the falls is to be in the water - it’s a lot easier then to move rocks around from below than setting them from above to get them where you want them.

To finish your waterfall, place your hose or hoses where you like them, put a flat rock or two on top to hold them in place. Now put a rock in front of the hose to spread the water out. Put some plants in the back to hide your hoses and soften the rocks.

Hope you got the spa running to soak away your sore muscles after moving all that rock once.