Can I build my own river?

[montecristo]

OK, stream, not river.

I have a couple of acres, near the bottom of a hill, not on a flood plain, middle of nowhere. House water on site is from two wells. There is a medium-sized pond. Listed building.

Am I allowed to build a stream winding its way around the property?

Permission aside, is it feasible? Where would one start / what should I be looking for to learn more about how to do it?

[montecristo]

A pump? A quiet one. Possibly solar, although there's the listed building.

[montecristo]

Trichloroacetaldehyde chic said:

Micro hydro from the stream would give you enough output to power both a super-efficient superconductor pump, AND the special freezer to run it in.

I've only half understood that but that would be really good, if the stream was its own energy source.

Evanivitch said:

What are you planning to line your route with? Flowing water is going to wear away earth or even standard pond liner eventually, so your meandering stream will straighten out. Unless you intend to use stone/concrete?

I'd be fine with stone or brick. You raise a good point and that's why I asked, to know what to look out for.

[montecristo]

bobtail4x4 said:

a local barn conversion has a gravel bed stream in the garden, it runs from under a rockery about 30m to a real stream , the trick is it does not connect to the real stream, due to a sheet of glass, he has koi swimming in it,

Ha, that's clever. There are a couple of real streams, according to maps, bordering the land, but they are more farm ditches with barely a trickle of water, and only in wet months.

[montecristo]

dmsims said:

Did this a couple of yeras ago when looking at replacing 2 pond pumps

Thank you, that could be very useful.

[montecristo]

skilly1 said:

I created a stream starting from a top pool, down a stream to a middle pool, then again a stream to a bottom pool.

Pumps in bottom pool pump water to top of a rock waterfalll. Someone mentioned dirty water pumps, we used 2 big dirty water pumps, 3 phase, you want volume of water, not high pressure so they work well.

You need wiers at end of each pool/stream to hold water should pumps stop, otherwise bottom pool floods.

Stream and pools have slate chipping a in to make look nice, also it holds fine particles and makes it run clear.

You wants pools at least 1m deep so water does not get too hot and you would get a lot of algae.

I used a company which lines the pool and streams using heavy duty plastic welded together, they also put a protective material under and over the plastic to stop it getting punctured.

I was going to line with a special self healing clay liner called bentonite but my walls were too steep for it. Sounds like it would be good for your project.

Excellent, thank you. Bentonite is what we've used in the pond.