Austin Pond Society

We started looking in earnest into this project in early 2022 as we had a wooden deck that was beginning to feel its age and harboring a mosquito breeding ground. This was preventing us from enjoying our backyard for most of the year. It was a shame because we are fortunate enough to back up to a very large greenbelt which is made up of the Slaughter Creek Greenbelt, the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center, the Veloway and a Nature Conservancy. We are often visited by deer, foxes, coyotes, an occasional bobcat and numerous other Central Texas wildlife. A perfect place for an evening glass of wine while watching the sun go down. 

    We have enjoyed the Austin Pond Tours for a number of years and had decided to incorporate a pond into our renovation, if possible, when the time came. Our very close friends, Chris and Alice Gunter, have a large stream behind their house they have enjoyed for 20 plus years now so we turned to them for a recommendation. They only had one, David Mahler who had designed the water features at the Lady Bird Wildflower Center. Getting on David’s schedule was a bit of a challenge as he is extremely busy. We had our drawings by July and the project commenced in late August with the demolition of the very large wooden deck. Jorge Martinez with Rustic Boulder Designs was our contractor. He and his team of stone masons commenced work in early September and by late October the project was completed. 

    We already had a stone pathway leading from the driveway to the rear of the property and the old wooden deck. This was incorporated into the stream and pond with a large rock staircase going up to a large rock bridge that connects to a large upper stone deck, which overlooks the stream, terraces and large seating area. Our stream and pond are built to be extremely user friendly with very large central Texas rock. It has a cement base and the placement of rocks allows for a bog system to run the length of the stream and final pond. This, in turn, allows us to plant riparian plants which are both interesting and different than anything we have ever had before. We plan to keep our stream and pond as representative as possible of a hill country stream and hope to have only native plants, fish, insects and amphibians found in the area. The four waterfalls provide a delightful sound of running water which is something we have always enjoyed.

    I think most people on the pond tour will enjoy how we have tried to incorporate mostly native plants into our landscape, but we also enjoy zinnias and hope to have a riot of color for people to experience. We are only about 8 months into the pond thing so we are learning as we go. It has been an interesting experience.