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4. Inlets to let water into the pond
83 You will need an inlet to let water into your pond when you want to fill it.
84 You should place the inlet at the point nearest to the water supply. Most often this will be at or near the upper end of your pond.
85 Your inlet can be made from a piece of heavy bamboo or a pipe of plastic or metal. The inlet pipe should be about 10 centimetres in diameter.
86 The inlet pipe should be long enough to reach through the top of the bank from one side to the other. You will need a pipe about 3 metres long to reach through the bank at the upper end of your pond.
87 Now dig a gap in the bank where you want the inlet to be. It should be a little above the water level on the inside of your pond and a little below the level of the water that flows from the source outside your pond.
88 Put the inlet pipe in the gap in the bank and rebuild the bank over it.
89 You can also make an inlet by cutting a shallow trench through the bank to let the water into the pond.
90 If you use a shallow trench to get water into your pond, you can improve it and keep it from washing away by using a trough of roofing metal to line the bottom of the trench.
91 You can also build a sluice in the trench to control the flow of water into the pond.
92 This sluice has a wall on each side of the trench and a floor set into the bottom of the trench. There are slots in the walls to hold wooden boards or a screen.
93 Boards are put into the slots to keep water out of the pond or taken out to let water in. When you are filling the pond, put in a screen to keep out wild fish.
94 You can build a sluice from wood, or if you know how to build with bricks or blocks, you can use these.
95 The drawings below and on the next page show you how to build an inlet sluice using wood.
Figure 60 - BUILDING A WOODEN INLET SLUICE
Figure 61 - HOW TO BUILD A SCREEN
Figure 62 - PARTS OF A WOODEN INLET SLUICE
Figure 63 - WHERE TO PUT AN INLET SLUICE IN THE POND BANK
Summary
YOU HAVE LEARNED HOW TO PREPARE TO BRING WATER INTO EACH POND
Provide an inlet for each pond:
Dig a small, horizontal inlet ditch to each pond inlet
Build an inlet sluice
