Natural garden pools swap chlorine for hydroponics
This natural swim pond in Gorham provides multigenerational fun. PHOTO: CHRIS PAQUETTE
By Amy Paradysz
Avery Pierce steps into her pool in Buxton, settles herself on her float, and observes a frog gazing at her from a lily pad. Surrounded by irises, lavender musk, marsh marigold and cattails, she listens contentedly to the flow of water and the call of birds.
This backyard nirvana is what she and her husband, Tom Lanucha, imagined when they read an article about “natural swimming pools” in Fine Gardening magazine 18 years ago. At that time, there wasn’t anyone in Maine building swimming pools with bio-filtration. But Chris and Teri Paquette of Robin’s Nest Aquatics already had a decade of experience with landscaping and creating water features like ponds.
“They had never done something that was supposed to be a swimming pool,” Pierce says. “But we investigated it together, and Chris is the one who really made it happen.”
Picking up on what Europeans had already been doing for more than a decade, Chris Paquette has since become Maine’s expert on what he calls “garden swim ponds” (which are larger and more organically shaped) and “natural swimming pools” (which are closer to the size and shape of a traditional in-ground swimming pool).
“Both are filtered by plants and biology with a mechanical system of pumps and skimmers that move the water,” Paquette says. “A pump draws water from the pool and pushes it into a filtration bed—an area or combination of areas equal to the size of the swim zone and stuffed with plants. The goal is that the plants starve the water of nutrients that would otherwise grow algae.”
By late summer, Avery Pierce’s aquatic plants are filtering, blooming and creating a living wall of privacy. PHOTO: AVERY PIERCE
Pierce and Lanucha have a 15 by 25 feet swim zone, which is 3 feet deep on one end, where they have granite entry stairs, and 5½ feet on the other. The black pool liner is made of long-lasting EPDM [ethylene propylene diene monomer] rubber and retains some of the sun’s heat, warming the pool to about 70 degrees. A submerged wood wall divides the swim zone from the regenerative zone, which surrounds the pool on three sides—everywhere except the patio. The 5-footwide regenerative zone is 5 to 8 inches deep and filled with gravel and aquatic plants. Water gets moved through that area and cleaned without chlorine or anything else harmful to the environment.
“Look at it like a large hydroponics system—growing plant material in a soilless medium,” Paquette says. “That’s basically what this is. We’re using crushed rock and aquatic plants that are installed bare-root. These plants’ roots will go into the crushed rock and absorb nutrients out of the water. It filters the water really well.”
In fact, Lanucha has been known to take a glass of water out of the pool, hold it up to the sun and pronounce it crystal clear.
“And it’s soft water,” Pierce says. “It feels wonderful on your skin, like a lake or pond.”
Their property is sloped, which means that they look down toward the pool, which can start to show a very faint green hue in the summer. When that happens, about twice a year, they add two quarts of a natural cleaning product called Green Clean, and the algae disappears within a couple of hours. Green Clean is used by farmers to keep algae down in livestock watering holes, and, in fact, Lanacha says their swimming pool doubles as a watering hole.
“Birds love it,” Lanucha says. “And dragonflies have several hatchlings a year. Thanks to the dragonflies and birds, and with the water constantly moving, we don’t have any problems with mosquitos. In the spring we have peepers—they sure have a lot to say!—and some of them turn into frogs.”
A plant-filled regenerative zone surrounds three sides of this natural swimming pool in Buxton. PHOTO: CHRIS PAQUETTE
Lanucha is a retired landscaper, and his wife shares his passion for gardening—both the aquatic plants in the regenerative zone and the ones in the sprawling ornamental garden beyond the pool. They deadhead plants after they bloom, divide plants when necessary, cut the vegetation back in the fall and rake out leaves in the spring.
“For me, it’s a labor of love,” Lanucha says. “A natural pool is like a living ecosystem, and we are the caretakers. When I’m out there with a skimmer or a vacuum, I get into that feeling of zen.”
Even if the work is relaxing, Pierce adds, “This is definitely not less maintenance than a regular swimming pool.”
But the goal isn’t lower maintenance, it’s lower impact on the environment. And it’s not for everyone.
Garden swim ponds are larger and more naturally shaped than natural swimming pools, but they function the same. PHOTO: CHRIS PAQUETTE
Lani Wharton remembers seeing a natural swimming pool in 2007 for the first time and hiring Robin’s Nest to build one in her yard in Brunswick.
“We had built a very natural-looking house, and a regular swimming pool would have stuck out like a sore thumb,” she says. “We were near the ocean but couldn’t walk there, and my husband enjoyed swimming.”
The natural swimming pool they designed with Robin’s Nest had a long, narrow shape ideal for swimming laps, and was surrounded by aquatic plants in the regenerative zone, with a waterfall at one end.
“There were water lilies around the edges, which I loved the look of—so calming and delicate,” Wharton says. “Different things were in bloom throughout the summer. Around the waterfall, we had canna lilies, irises and lots of mint.”
Three years later, however, circumstances changed, and they sold the property to a couple from California who loved the natural swimming pool and thought they wanted to move back to Maine … but never did.
“They had a friend come maintain it,” Wharton says. “But it’s not a low-maintenance thing. I mean, I didn’t start taking the plants out in the fall until October, so I’d get out there in a wetsuit and store the plants in the basement for the winter. By the time the second sale happened, the new owners wanted a regular yard and filled it all in.”
Having come to that sad conclusion to her natural swimming pool story, Wharton sighs.
“With the lights on the water, it was gorgeous and really fun to swim at night,” she says. “And the water felt like swimming in silk.”
To date, Robin’s Nest has built 20 natural swimming pools throughout New England, with at least half a dozen more on the books for this summer. In Maine, the typical customer is near the coast, from Kennebunkport to Brunswick but west of I-95. “They’re saying, basically, I can’t afford oceanfront, so I’ll move near it,” Paquette says. “But I want some waterfront.”
Robin’s Nest Aquatics offers full packages with pool plants and a dock or patio as well as less-expensive DIY kits.
“Some of my customers are grandparents who want a magnet for their grandkids to come and have a blast,” Paquette says. “Others are young professionals, typically with two careers and a couple of kids, and they want to spend a lot of time in their yard. It’s an educational experience, both learning to swim and caring for the habitat.”
This article appeared in the Summer 2024 edition of Green & Healthy Maine HOMES. Subscribe today!
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