Before You Dig, You Need to Determine The Volume Of Your Pond

Before you build a water garden and water feature it is important to know what the volume of water will be within the pond. The garden pond design you build will have a direct bearing on all the equipment you need to purchase and ultimately the price. A well designed pond not only looks and fits the landscape, but it works together as a system to maintain high water quality and efficient use. Because the equipment you need to purchase is rated for volume you must determine the volume of the pond before you can select a filter system, pump or pond liner.  Purchasing a quality pond kit will ensure that your equipment will work as a system.

To determine the pond volume you need to do some figuring and basic math. You need to determine the total surface area and multiply it by the depth of the feature. If the pond is a symmetrical shape such as a rectangle or circle, it is fairly easy to determine.

Square or Rectangle: You simply multiply the length and width and that will give you the surface area. Then determine the depth and multiply the two to get the pond volume.

Circular:You need to multiply the radius by itself and then multiplied by 3.14 (pi) - this will determine the surface area and then you need to multiply it by the depth to obtain the volume.

Irregular: For irregular shaped ponds you need to divide the pond into sections that each have a symmetrical shape such as a circle or square then add the results of each section together for an approximate surface area. Don’t forget to multiply the surface area by the depth to determine the pond volume.

The mathematics is simpler if the measurements are done in decimal fraction of feet. Instead of basing your calculation on 18 inches you would use 1.5 feet. This will give you a volume measurement in cubic feet and can be converted into gallons if desired. (Multiply the cubic feet by 6.25) The average depth will suffice in your calculations if you have ledges or multi levels or you can do an individual calculation for each level.

Knowing this information will help you in choosing your garden pond design, the purchase of equipment and supplies and will help give you some concrete figures that you can use as you try to make the vision of building your garden pond become a reality.