My DIY Waterfall Water Feature

I decided to build my own waterfall water feature after I saw the prices charged by commercial retailers for preformed garden waterfalls!

Admittedly, the latest manufacturing techniques have enabled much more realistic designs and larger scale creations. Some of the artificial rock vertical waterfalls and cascades on offer are absolutely stunning. However with price tags over $1,000 they were automatically excluded from consideration for my waterfall water feature project. Therefore a DIY waterfall is my choice.

Initially I imagined my waterfall cascading down a rendered section of my brick garage wall. This would have had some inherent problems:

• Waterproofing the brick wall to prevent leakage into my garage
• The pipes supplying the water would either have to come from inside my garage/wall or be carefully disguised
• An alternative of free falling cascade into a pond seemed even more appealing

The most effective way of achieving this is to have the waterfall cascade from a small entry pond which is mounted about head high and backing onto my garage wall. Obviously I'll need to support this with some form of stand which can also hold the PVC pipe carrying pumped water from my storage tank. I'll hide all of this supporting structure behind a combination of plants, rocks and logs.

Through my local freecycle group I've now added two trailer loads of garden rocks, 30 pieces of slate rock and some paving bricks to my supply of materials. I've also collected a number of pieces of gum tree logs from near one of my running trails. These had been lopped by the local parks authority and left for firewood (presumably). Other additions include some treated pine posts which had been rendered useless as road barriers when broken off by wayward cars.

Freecycle was also the source of two childrens wading pools - these are probably not durable enough to use as permanent ponds but could be adapted to use as a container for a bog pond or maybe just to hold decomposing mulch.

Speaking of mulch, there is a garden center near home that stocks various mulches, sands and soils in large open bins. Enthusiastic drivers of their front end loaders occasionally push the contents over the back of the bins and onto the grass strip alongside the sidewalk. Over the years small piles of weathered mulches have accumulated. I am going to offer to 'clean up' these piles in return for being able to barrow away the 'rubbish'. To learn more about other water features for the backyard return to backyard water feature from waterfall water feature