Ponds and wildlife

You will be amazed how quickly freshwater species find your pond, so there is no need for you to introduce any from other ponds. With the correct marginal planting, you will soon hear the drumming sound of dragonfly wings hovering over the surface. Creating hiding places with rocks and plants at the edge of the pond will provide habitat for frogs and newts.

It is not recommended to transfer amphibians or their spawn/tadpoles to other ponds for a number of reasons, probably most notable is the potential to transfer disease, but also that any frogs/toads you move may try to get back to their original pond instinctively, and may not survive. See this article from the Amphibian & Reptile Trust.

Natural succession in a new garden pond blog

If you do find that you have spawn which isn't developing, there's  info on the Froglife pages here with a suggestion that when there isn’t enough light on the pond, this may have an impact. It also suggests getting the spawn out into a bucket to check if it's the pond:

There is also information on ARC's page under "Why are my spawn / tadpoles disappearing from my pond or failing to develop?"

Britain has two native frogs and two toads, and three species of newts. Of these, the common frog and common toad are likely to be found in gardens throughout Britain. The common or smooth newt and the palmate newt are also widely distributed, while some ponds may even contain the scarce great crested newt.

A series of ponds in a neighbourhood creates a vital link for amphibians to move through our fragmented landscape. Make sure your pond has at least one side of the pool that gradually slopes up to dry land. This enables the young amphibians to leave the water in mid-summer once the tadpole stage is over. When in the pond, frogs and toads need a point above the water on which to rest and breathe. In the summer a water lily pad may suffice but a more permanent solution is to position a few rocks or logs half in and half out of the water if there are no suitable areas of shallow water.

Newts are probably the most aquatic of British amphibians. Attract them by allowing grass to grow over the pond edge into the water and introducing non-invasive submerged aquatic plants. Newts use narrow-leaved water plants on which to lay their eggs, placing each egg between a folded leaf.

The introduction of fish into wildlife ponds is generally not advised, as they can eat smaller animals, including spawn and mayfly larvae. 

In the autumn, amphibians will look for suitable sheltered places where they can hibernate until the spring. Log piles provide good shelters but frogs, toads and newts will also find suitable places in hedge bottoms, compost heaps and under stones. Allowing fallen leaves to remain on lawns can provide a place for frogs to hibernate, while also providing homes for invertebrates. Amphibians will also hibernate in the silt at the bottom of ponds, so make sure you only de-silt once every five years and before the hibernating process has begun.

Great-crested newts are designated and protected as European protected species, so it’s an offence to deliberately capture, injure or kill or deliberately disturb them.

Natural England advise that undertaking pond management should normally be carried out in late autumn through winter, typically 1st November to 31st January, when Great-crested newts are unlikely to be present in ponds. But even then it should be done with care, otherwise you may need to look into obtaining a licence, or getting someone with a licence to undertake the works; click here for more info. 

With GCN present, it is advised to go through the vegetation you remove by hand and return any newts and other wildlife you find to the pond. There are some good handbooks available online regarding ponds with GCN, if you'd like to know more:

Arc Trust and Froglife

To record your Great-crested newt sighting, visit the Record Pool website which the Shropshire & Staffordshire Amphibian Group can access.

Ponds can attract species into your garden that are a true gardeners friend!

Frogs and toads are known to consume a large number of slugs, snails and caterpillars every day (read more). Gardeners World, the RHS etc. all advocate having ponds and other wildlife habitats to help control pests in gardens. 

The Freshwater Habitats Trust research also demonstrates how beneficial ponds are to biodiversity, including "the exceptional value and impact of ponds, despite their small size".

Find out more on our Invasive Non-Native Species webpage.

Ponds naturally change over time, often becoming overgrown and can eventually end up as dry hollows with little evidence of their former existence. 

If you have any dead leaf matter or areas overgrown with pond plants it is good to remove some of this. The former can release too much nutrient into your pond, causing algal blooms and a lack of oxygen, while the latter can end up choking a pond and leaving no open water space for other wildlife to, for example, perform courtship displays (such as newts require).

The general rule of thumb is to restore just a small section of a pond per year, so that the majority of creatures have somewhere to thrive while you work on another area. Leave plants etc. that you are removing at the edge of the pond for a week or so, so that any other wildlife can easily crawl back into the safety of the water. After that, you can remove the algae, vegetation etc and add it to your compost heap, it is full of nutrients and great for gardens (providing there are no invasive non-native plant species present).

As well as searching through our species explorer pages online here, we also recommend the following:

Online

- The Freshwater Habitats Trust have a selection of useful guides to creating/restoring ponds.

Books and leaflets

- The Field Studies Council produce fold out waterproof guides to pond wildlife.

- Collins: Freshwater Life – Britain and Europe by Greenhalgh and Ovenden.

- Collins Gem: Pond Life by Manuel and Shields.

- Making Wildlife Ponds: How to Create a Pond to Attract Wildlife to Your Garden (Gardening with Nature) by Jenny Steel. Jenny is a Shropshire resident and has turned her garden into a wildlife haven. She has some advice on pond creation online here.

Camera Traps

Once your pond has established or if you have one already in your garden, a great way to see what is using it (especially mammals such as hedgehogs or foxes) is to set up a camera trap. Our mammal expert Stuart, shares his top tips for buying and installing these traps to record a variety of wildlife here.

Recording species

If you are happy to share information on any of the wildlife you find in your garden, the Shropshire Ecological Data Network would be delighted to receive your records - click here.