Best timber for reinforcing the bank of a large pond

[felixthelogchopper]

If the posts are going to stay wet, Alder is good.

[woody paul]

Have used chestnut palling on a small pond, But why not just grade bank back so not steep.    

[Yournamehere]

47 minutes ago, david lawrence said:

Living willow revetment ?

 

only needs trimmed back once a year

 

cheap easy and no heavy machinery required thus saving the ground

 

could be an option

 

 

...and every year you when you go to cut it down someone will come along and say oh don't cut that down I don't want you to cut that down oh it looked so nice before you cut it down so you take 'em aside and have a chat and explain how the willow was put in as a living revetment and that it needs cutting back to keep it tidy and small and to encourage growth to as to actually form that living revetment because it was considered much more pleasant to have a living revetment than a load of steel pilings or railway sleepers held in with scaffold boards and they just look at you blankly and say yes but I still don't want you to cut it down cos I like it how it is and it will look horrible if you cut it down and it will die so you try again and say that the bank isn't strong enough to support the weight of a big willow because as the willows grow they lean out over the water and as they form an enclosed canopy no light gets through and because no light gets through nothing grows beneath them to knit the bank together with its roots and so eventually if the willows are not cut they fall over and take the bank with them because if the bank had been strong enough to support the willows the willows would not have had to have been put there as a living revetment in the first place not withstanding the additional fact that all the leaves drop into the pond and form a black stinky oozy mud that again because there is no light and no vegetation creates so much gas that if you wade through it and release the gas it stinks worse than walking into a cat's fart and that cutting them back won't kill the willows that willows are often cut back and they grow again and they just look at you as if you are mad cos they can't believe that anything would grow again after being cut down so they go and tell the owner who tells them it's fine the willows are a living revetment and that they have to be cut down every year.

 

...and the year after that all this happens again, and again and every year thereafter until one day the owner sells up and someone new moves in and this time instead of saying that it's ok the willow will grow back again it's part of the seasonal maintenance you've been doing it for forty years, the new owner comes rushing out with cries of oh my god oh my god what on earth are you doing you're killing all the trees why are you cutting them down you're ruining it...

 

... and as much as you love the place and you love working there and have spent your whole life there because of your love for it when really you know you should of have moved on years ago but hey who wants a proper job when you've got paradise you realise that well you're nearly sixty and life is short and there's not much left so time to move on and the willows grow up and they grow out and the bank that wasn't very strong still isn't very strong and the willows are only shallow rooted and one night there's a great storm and all the willows topple over into the lake and willow being willow the branches all take root in the mud and throw out new growth which all joins up and creates a lifeless stinking swamp even further out into the lake and over the years the willow spreads further and further out into the lake until, eventually, there is no lake, just wet woodland but it happened so slowly no one really noticed; early on there was a pond fringed with willow and later on there was some willow fringed with a pond but the pond was lost and no one missed it because by the time the pond was lost no-one new there had been a pond there - it was just swampy woodland - it had always been just swampy woodland.

 

And all because you didn't use railway sleepers and scaffold tubes like you were told to!!!

 

Happy days 

Yourn

[Matthew Storrs]

I did a large stretch of riverside revetment a few years back, it was all pretty sensitive salmon spawning grounds so treated wood was out of the question. massive eroded sections of riverbank. I used all materials I had coppiced from the river bank- basicallly got some large 8” diameter alder trunks- pointed them and drove them into the riverbed leaning back a  post every 6 foot. Then I used all the willow brash and weaved it  between the alder posts and back filled with the soil/rocks that the river had washed to one side.

 

certainly worked well at the time and my Hope was that all the willow would root in and other vegetation established and hold it together by the time the Alder posts had rotted off. If the Batter of the banks are fairly shallow it helps.

[Bunzena]

Thanks a mill to all those who have replied.  I've really been around the houses looking all the options. 

 

Considered Willow [as spiling] - but as mentioned above - I think there's more maintenance than I'm after!

 

Considered grading the bank too - but given the space we have to play with [quite narrow and want to plant directly behind] - that's not a preferred option.

 

Had not considered the use of scaffold poles - that's a neat idea.  Thanks Steve and Yournamehere.

 

Matthew - I really like the sound of what you've done - but I may have trouble sourcing the materials. 

 

On balance - I think - the option of using Chestnut posts and boards might work - but any other thoughts gratefully received...

[Khriss]

Alder ( waterwheel wood) or Elm. K

[Steve Bullman]

44 minutes ago, Bunzena said:

Thanks a mill to all those who have replied.  I've really been around the houses looking all the options. 

 

Considered Willow [as spiling] - but as mentioned above - I think there's more maintenance than I'm after!

 

Considered grading the bank too - but given the space we have to play with [quite narrow and want to plant directly behind] - that's not a preferred option.

 

Had not considered the use of scaffold poles - that's a neat idea.  Thanks Steve and Yournamehere.

 

Matthew - I really like the sound of what you've done - but I may have trouble sourcing the materials. 

 

On balance - I think - the option of using Chestnut posts and boards might work - but any other thoughts gratefully received...

pics when you're done please!

[LGP Eddie]

Did some with Concrete Sleepers, sounds horrendous, but decide for yourselves?

 

First row upside down to form a footing, then stacked using the angled sides to best advantage to form a slope profile.

Backfill as you put each layer in, and stagger the joints.

 

Eddie.

[Steve Bullman]

14 minutes ago, LGP Eddie said:

Did some with Concrete Sleepers, sounds horrendous, but decide for yourselves?

 

First row upside down to form a footing, then stacked using the angled sides to best advantage to form a slope profile.

Backfill as you put each layer in, and stagger the joints.

 

Eddie.

Nice neat job

[tree-fancier123]

nice job above with concrete sleepers

greenheart is one of the best timbers for piling, but expensive