Causes of Water Loss | Utah Water Gardens

Pond water loss from Weather Conditions

Hot weather can cause a lot of evaporation. The amount of water lost can vary on many factors such as temperature, humidity, sun exposure, surface area, streams and length, wind and excess splashing. There are several different estimates from 1-2% of gallons in pond per day to 1-2 inches of water from the surface.
Ice can be especially dangerous where there is little margin of error. Low water flow or movement can cause water to freeze thus redirecting the water. Closely monitor how your feature is handing the weather. Some features such as water falls and streams should be turned off for the season. Using aeration in areas of the pond will disturb the surface water and prevent it from freezing over.

Getting cheap pond liner can cost you in the end – It can be brittle, not flexible enough or simply too thin. If you want your pond to last its worth the investment in the correct liner.
Failure to use underlayment fabric such as geotextile can leave your pond liner vulnerable to animals burrowing through it, sharp rocks or debris that are only pushed to the surface under the weight of the water above it.
Not one consistent piece of pond liner. Meaning when the pond was made they did not use one piece of liner, they stacked heavy rocks over an overlapping area in attempt to water tight. Assuming it is water tight moving the wrong rock at a point in the future could open the seam up to leaking.
Plants roots penetrating the liner. We have seen cases of plants making their way through brittle liner or also getting through liner that has not been spliced.

Typical mistakes of the pond construction itself can be to not dig on virgin soil. The longer ground has had time to settle the better. Digging out an area with a backhoe and back filling portions of it latter can definitely cause settling. When the ground settles it pulls the liner from one of the edges.
Cutting too short or failure to leave room for the ground to settle. Typically you want have enough liner to not only meet the edges but extend past and tug some back into the ground vertically.
People standing on edges can erode the walls eventually causing sinkage and even lumps in the walls. The result of this is an edge that leaks water. This can be especially common in streams since grading may no always be consist ant. Using mortar collars on ponds in particular can prevent this problem.

You will be often be surprised on how much water you can lose to the smallest splash. Hold your hand out for a brief period in areas surrounding splash zones to test this. If you feel water then you are losing water to splash. Look at the rocks around long streams or waterfalls, are they wet? If water is not draining back to the stream then its going to be lost to evaporation.
Adjustment of rocks on purpose or by accident can change the splash zones. Start by redirecting water closer to its source by moving rocks and you can change its flow dramatically.
Too many rocks – Try to reduce rocks in areas of running water to create a deeper channel. It can give it more of a direct path to the pond.

Improper grading can cause areas of the surrounding soil to run off into the pond. Sometimes that ends up at the bottom of your pond or it builds up into your streams. You can generally look at the edges to get an idea but also looking them over during the rain can really point them out. Adjust your areas of runoff but adjust the liner or by crating natural barriers to divert the water and soil.
Over long periods of time soil, sediment and other fine waste will start to accumulate in streams. This will typically raise the water level thus coming into contact with external areas of the stream creating a cycle of runoff. Monitoring these areas and removing sediment will prevent this.

Allowing leaves or other debris to remain in stream will cause them to eventually get caught in rocks thus raising the water level and redirecting water.

Cloth liner such as geotextile in a spillway. The intention of putting geotextile under the liner and then again over the liner when placing heavy rocks on a particular area can be good idea. The problem is however when its used in more vertical areas such as a spill way. This can cause water to wick up the cloth and of the pond.
Plants can also act like a wick as well. Keep them from overgrowing and look for areas where plants have roots inside and outside of the feature. Also look for areas where they may be extending up and over the feature and coming in contact with the water.

Cleaning your mechanical filters on a regular basis will help to make sure it doesn’t get overloaded. If your filter get full overtime it will clog and/or slowly acquire a leak due to water not being able to exit quick enough. Filters are great areas to remove sediment from the system.
Bog filters periodically will need to have portions of pea gravel removed, cleaned and re added to make sure that water is able to escape evenly. When one area is under pressure to release all water can pool higher then expected causing water to escape your water feature.
Plants should be managed and pruned as appropriate or they will change the water level and redirect the flow of water.
Unsecured or unintended obstructions in your pond. A few examples of this could be a filter medium pad in a water outlet not being weighted down. The filter medium floats, obstructs significant flow of water causing a leak. Another example could be several floating water plants in another pond upstream, they float down and get stuck in every rocks damning up the water. This redirects the water out of the water feature.
General plumbing issues like cracked or broken pipes causing water to exit underground.
Pumps moving too much water too fast. It is always a good idea to have some control over your water flow. Being able to turn a ball valve to throttle back the pressure can save a lot of headache.

If you believe you have a leak please read Finding A Leak In Your Pond