Ponds have disappeared from Britain’s landscape at a steady rate for thousands of years. Ever since the industrial revolution, this loss of ponds has rapidly accelerated and during the last 100 years, Britain has lost 90% of its ponds.

Three thousand years ago, Britain was an island covered by extensive wetlands. Gradually, through natural processes, a proportion of the pools that would make up these wetlands would naturally dry up or fill with silt and debris to eventually be lost forever. With nature allowed to proceed uninterrupted, these deceased ponds would be replaced with some level of equilibrium, by new ponds. In actuality, with man making his own demands on the available dry land, new ponds would form less readily which led to the slow and steady disappearance observed over many hundreds of years.

As time progressed, man not only interrupted the natural creation of ponds, but actively reclaimed wetlands to use for agriculture. This process clearly accelerated the demise of the British pond.

The relatively recent prevalence of both industrial machinery and plumbing caused a rapid increase in the loss of Britain’s ponds and wetlands. It was both unnecessary to have ponds positioned strategically around the countryside and also far easier to reclaim land on a scale not previously achievable.

Britain’s wildlife has clearly suffered from this extensive loss so the humble water garden has become a last bastion for maintaining a significant sample of our wildlife heritage.