New barrel pond with NZ natives

November 2025

Ever since the dragonfly landed on me last year, the idea of a pond will not go away. However, still water is a haven for mosquitoes and both my son and I are very susceptible to their bites. Videos from the USA say that once you have dragonflies, mosquitoes are no longer a problem. Our fantails eat them too, but not enough by themselves, because every time I work in the garden I get bitten and I work in the garden a lot.

Striped mosquito, Aedes notoscriptus, an introduced daytime biting mosquito. Yes, that's my hand.

I want to provide another water source for wildlife and I want to provide a habitat for freshwater invertebrates. Let's be honest here - one freshwater invertebrate in particular - dragonflies. So, in the same way I had a trial butterfly garden to convince hubby it was a good idea to dig up the lawn, I now have a trial pond so I can convince him to dig up even more of the lawn.

Starting with a barrel pond is a way of checking whether the place the in-ground pond can go is the right place. Is it too close to bamboo and trees that drop leaves, and does it have the right amount of sun on it? A lot of videos online say that ponds have to be in full sun for plant growth, but we are subtropical here and the pond water heating in summer is not a good thing for things living it it, so morning sun and afternoon shade would be best, I would have thought.

There is also a lot of advice about not having ponds by trees. In this garden that would mean not having a pond! Unfortunately we do have some trees that are deciduous, i.e. drop their leaves in autumn. Leaves in the pond can add nutrients that encourages algal growth. I think at that stage of year I'll just put netting across the top. The bamboo sheds stuff all the time, but it seems to go everywhere, not just where the pond will go. It also seems dry, which might mean it will not add the same nutrient load.

The best guide for setting up a barrel pond I found was this one, by the WWT, the wetlands UK charity.

Barrel ponds can be cheap in the UK and US by the looks of things on social media, but here in New Zealand they definitely are not. The cheapest half barrel on Trade Me was $100. In the end I got a new one from my local Mitre 10 Mega. Then you need aquatic plants and baskets, aquatic compost and gravel to keep the soil from floating. It definitely mounts up. You could do it more cheaply with a different container - I did start the plants in a $4 bucket - and getting plant cuttings from friends with ponds.

While we sorted the barrel, the plants lived happily in a flexible bucket and wildlife moved in

There is only one shop in Auckland selling pond plants in any quantity - Stone and Water World. I was fortunate that I was setting up my pond at the start of spring when they had a large range of new plants arrive. Of course I wanted all the flowers, but I controlled myself. The barrel pond will allow me to grow aquatic plants up so that should the in-ground pond come to fruition, there are already good sized plants to go in it. Then I can have all the flowers for the pollinators once I have the space. I also wanted to have all native plants, because I thought they would be most useful to native freshwater wildlife, but in the end it is a mix.

I have chosen two oxygenators - Myriophyllum triphyllum, NZ water milfoil, and Gratiola Sexdentata, NZ gratiola. These should help reduce algae and keep the water healthy, as well as provide habitat for invertebrates. I have two cover (as in surface of the water) plants to help keep the water cool - a water lily I got off Trade Me (so definitely not native, but I've got to have one lovely flower, surely) and Ranunculus Amphitrichus, waoriki, which is a native water buttercup. As my tall plant I chose a golden Japanese sweet flag. A tall plant allows insect larvae to climb out of the pond. I wanted an oioi, but I couldn't find a cheap one in any garden centre and the Acorus Gramineus 'Ogon' brings movement and colour to the pond. I realise now this is what has been planted along the stream and I could have dug some up for free. When I have the real pond, I will probably move the plants from the stream and put them around the pond and plant more natives in their place along the stream edge.

Hubby got very creative with the barrel pond setting - a Union Jack inspired frame - not realising that animals need cover to approach water, but I think it will be fine if I can plant around where the logs are at the back. Indeed, it will be interesting to see if the different type of sunny surface will bring out creatures that need to warm up. I have put a lot of dark stones in the butterfly garden, recycling the old stone edging and putting down steppers, so a light surface may attract different creatures.

I did the layout of the barrel before I put the water in - which is definitely the best way to do things - but I filled the barrel before I had put in the supporting infrastructure and I definitely have not got the layout right. I had the sweet flag at the back, but the log ramp came up at the same place, so I moved it all around and now the sweet flag is knocking against the stone perch in the middle and the two cover plants are next to each other. Every time I try to move things around, soil comes out of the baskets. I may need to live with it as is for a while, or at least until the plant roots are holding the soil together better. You live and learn.

I have a stick for dragonflies, which doubles as a bird perch, and I have a big log to help animals gain the height to access the water. The stones inside are stepped, but I don't know if they are really a way of helping animals escape if they fall in. I don't want to encourage hedgehogs to use it and won't skinks and geckos be able to climb without the log? This is why we need some New Zealand guides to these things. Do we have the same range of chemicals in NZ tap water that requires either time or neutralising agents like the UK or US and means it is better to use rainwater? We have a water butt so I did use rainwater, but I wonder if I needed to, as the hose would have been so much easier.

A backswimmer, Genus Anisops, that found its way into the bucket pond

A wildlife pond here is definitely different from wildlife ponds overseas. For example, in the UK it definitely includes amphibians - native frogs and newts - but here in Aotearoa our native frogs are looking extinction in the eye and it is unclear whether making a home for the Australian frogs that were introduced is a good idea. What is certain is that in the summer, water dries up pretty quickly around here and a deeper source of water available to the birds is a good thing. A wildlife pond does not usually contain fish, because they eat all the eggs and larvae, and make the water significantly dirtier.

I have trained a trail camera on the pond to see if/how it is used. A female blackbird has been drinking from the half-barrel on a regular basis and also tried to have a wash in it. I don't know if the kingfisher was hunting or just having a bath, but the camera caught one flying out of the barrel pond. It also likes the stick perch. The pond also looks like it is starting to attract insects.

Action shot!

The barrel pond cannot take any credit for this, because this is by the house, but look who turned up today... The case for a pond is making itself!

Blue-spotted Hawker, Adversaeschna brevistyla, a native dragonfly

Insect life was already establishing in the bucket pond when I moved the plants over, so it may not be long before there are residents in the barrel pond. Watch this space!