Why a water feature might be just what your garden needs

Have you considered bringing a water feature into your garden? Strange as it may seem, a water pond uses less water than a lawn of comparable size. 

Roughly speaking, there are two kinds of water features: moving, sound-producing water features (streams, fountains, waterfalls) and calm, silent water features (ponds and pools).

The sound of water pulls you magnetically into a garden and you don’t need expertise in hydraulics to create this effect. Submersible pumps are simple to install and generate all the splash and gurgle you need. They can be used in a variety of water features, including waterfalls, with a price as low as 40 to 100 dollars.A water pond can be any size or shape and should be moderately sloped on the sides. Plastic liners are widely recommended for containing the water in your pond. You measure the dimensions of your potential pond and send them to liner manufacturers for a quote. You can place such a liner in any size excavation in your backyard or in a whiskey barrel on your patio or balcony. If you do not have much space for a water feature, you can also opt for a small, hard plastic tub.Take care not to locate your water garden in the shade. Flowering water plants are sun lovers, and they require at least six daily hours of unobstructed light to strut their petals. When a tree is allowed to grow up over a water garden, not only is light stolen from the aquatic plants, but tree roots may grow through the pond liner, causing leakage. If fallen leaves do reach the pond surface, remove them immediately. When leaves settle on the bottom of a pond, they remove oxygen and encourage the growth of algae.

Water lilies are everyone’s favorite pond plants, whether hardy or tropical. Hardy lilies disappear into dormancy in winter but come back each spring thanks to their durable rhizomes. Their flower colors are yellow, pink, red or white, while tropical lilies are typically blue and sometimes pink. Hardy water lilies can grow almost anywhere in the United States because of their cold tolerance. In Southern California, they are virtually evergreen, with some leaves visible even in the middle of winter. They propagate themselves by rhizomes and will persist for years.

Tropical water lilies grow from bulbs and are more delicate than their hardy cousins. They will not survive a severe frost. Yet, they are worth the risk if you live where it freezes occasionally because of their flowers, which have a strong fragrance, unlike the weakly scented hardy lilies. In addition, tropical lilies bloom far more abundantly than, by comparison, the somewhat sparsely blooming hardy lilies. Individual flowers of both types of lilies last four or five days. 

Hardy lilies bloom from late winter until early fall, whereas tropical lilies bloom from late spring until early winter. If you live in a reasonably frost-free area, try planting hardy and tropical lilies together. That way, you should have lilies of some sort blooming nearly year-round. Situate them in one- or five-gallon containers that rest on the bottom of your pond. 

Lotus plants (Nelumbo spp.) are related to water lilies, albeit with a habitat restricted to Asia and Australia. They can be best appreciated this time of year when blooming in the lake at Echo Park. Flowers are creamy white and blushed with pink. Lotus rhizomes are widely consumed in Asian countries and China devotes 750,000 acres to growing them, the same number of acres utilized in the United States for growing citrus fruit. Lotus plants go dormant in winter but are highly resilient, often living for more than a thousand years. A lotus seed found in a dry river bed in China, estimated to be 1,300 years old, was planted in 1995 and sprouted, the second oldest seed to have ever been germinated. (The oldest was a 2,000-year-old seed from a date palm discovered at the Masada fortress in the Judean desert). Each lotus fruit is highly visible, resembling the rose (derived from arroseur, the French word for sprinkler) on a watering can. Selected varieties of lotus show off gargantuan flowers, with as many as 5,000 petals per flower.

When considering plants for a water pond, as a contrast to floating water lily pads, select species with strong vertical lines such as horsetail (Equisetum hyemale), pickerel weed (Pontederia cordata), and cattail (Typha latifolia). 

Cattail, a California native found growing in marshes throughout the state, is a multi-purpose plant like no other. It is among the most nutritious ornamental species whose rhizomes have a sweet taste and may be eaten raw or cooked; these rhizomes grow up to two feet long and three inches in diameter and may be baked like potatoes. Young shoots, up to one and a half feet long, can also be consumed raw or cooked; their taste is similar to that of cucumbers and their consistency will remind you of asparagus. Immature cattail flower spikes may also be eaten raw or cooked; their flavor resembles that of sweet corn. Eat the seeds raw or cook them for their nutty flavor. Mix cattail pollen with flour and your pancakes and muffins turn out an inviting yellow color. Practical uses for cattails abound, from stuffing pillows with their soft hairs to utilizing their stems for caulking, thatching, and other construction purposes. Cattail is easily propagated by division or separation of young shoots from the mother plant, as long as a few roots are attached to the base of the shoots. Cattail is invasive so it will fill your pond quite rapidly, whereupon it provides a nesting ground for waterfowl that may be flying in the vicinity. You can locate two native cattail species at Tree of Life Nursery (californianativeplants.com)

One of the challenges of growing water lilies is keeping their pond free of algae. At the Tillman Water Reclamation facility in the Sepulveda Basin, tilapia have been used for this purpose in the small lake of reclaimed water on site. For years, water lily grower George Knopf succeeded in this mission, too. In his numerous ponds in Sylmar, the water was always crystal clear. He attributed this to stocking his ponds with goldfish, which are known as eager algae eaters. Although a submersible pump that keeps water moving and oxygenated can aid in keeping fish healthy, water lilies alone, as in Knopf’s case, may give off sufficient oxygen through their roots to satisfy the respiratory needs of goldfish in a pond environment. Knopf also claimed that the shallowness of his ponds – they were only 18 inches deep – helped achieve the proper balance between oxygen and nutrients needed to deter algae growth. To make sure leakage would never be a problem, he constructed his ponds out of plastic cement. 

California native of the week: Azolla or fairy moss (Azolla filiculoides), is a minute fern that floats on the water’s surface, spreading out like a mat as it grows. It makes its own nitrogen and then some through symbiosis with Anabaena, a microscopic blue-green algae. Its growth is rapid and dense and it can take over a water pond when ignored. Before it gets out of control, scoop it up and spread it over your garden as nitrogen-rich mulch. Due to its manufacture of nitrogen, the presence of azolla means free fertilizer for whatever grows in its vicinity. Thus, in Southeast Asia, Azolla is grown as a nourishing companion plant to rice. Azolla provides a bonus of turning from green to an attractive bronzish burgundy during late fall and winter. You can find Azolla, hardy and tropical water lilies, lotus, and around 200 other pond plants at Sunland Water Gardens (sunlandwatergardens.com).

If you have created a successful water pond with flora in or around it, you are invited to send your story to joshua@perfectplants.com. Your questions and comments as well as garden predicaments and successes are always welcome.