On the Front Range, where drought is a not-so-distant depressing memory and rainfall continues to run scant, a garden gains a lot from liquid assets: fountains, ponds, water gardens and – increasingly – waterfalls.
“Waterfalls are an increasing trend. More and more people really are understanding the benefits and the beauty of the sound of water in their yards,” said Jim Arneill, who serves as vice president of the Colorado Water Garden Society. The society lays claim to being the world’s first official water garden group. That this organization pooled in landlocked Denver might seem incongruous, but not to Martin Hakubai Mosko, a landscape architect who founded the Boulder-based Marpa Design Studio (marpa.com)
“In our high desert, we are the source of all the water. All water for the east and the west originates from the Continental Divide, so water is not a second thought to our climate,” Mosko said. “We are the source.”
Marpa tends toward high-end jobs, but when Arneill added a waterfall to the pond in his suburban backyard about 14 years ago, he did it for about $100.
A waterfall for any yard
“It doesn’t have to be a large, massive body of water to have motion and sound. More and more people are trying to incorporate it, and I think we’ll see even more waterfalls because people visit a yard that has one, and they find the sound so soothing and settling that they want a waterfall in their yard, too.”
Whatever the yard’s style, there’s a waterfall that will fit.
“Waterfalls can be very formal or very informal,” says Arneill. “Some focus on beautiful stone work, others blend in with natural surroundings.”
And all are relatively water-efficient. A retired assistant principal, Arneill emphasized that one of the Colorado Water Garden Society’s functions is to research matters such as insects in ponds and water-conservation issues.
“We’ve had some mixed results, but in some cases these recirculating water features use less water than if the space were grass that needed to be watered,” he said. “There is some loss from evaporation, but it’s not that significant.”
Mosko agreed. He considers pools and waterfalls within the constrictions of water conservation.
“It’s a common misconception that ponds and waterfalls use a lot of water,” he said, “but they’ve been shown to use less water than a bluegrass lawn.”
A cascade of benefits
Even though he estimates that a waterfall increases evaporation by about 15 percent over standing water, the water lost to evaporation is balanced by gains. Along with aesthetically enhancing the landscape, creating white noise that masks ambient sounds, attracting birds, oxygenating water for fish, and reducing the threat of increasingly menacing mosquitoes laying eggs, waterfalls add humidity to the atmosphere, enhancing the growth of plants.
“And waterfalls are major generators of negative ions, which purify the atmosphere and make you feel refreshed and better about yourself, and so your energy level goes up,” Mosko added.
Energy, of course, has long been associated with waterfalls. Arneill visited New Zealand last winter and was mesmerized by Huka Falls, which generates electricity for much of the area.
Mosko, whose designs incorporate the five elements – earth, water, fire, air and space – uses water or the suggestion of water in every one of his designs. And as a Buddhist scholar and Zen monk, Mosko prefers waterfalls, and links them to his spirituality. He notes that in Japanese gardens, waterfalls are associated with the Buddha of compassion.
“The waterfall is the emanation of the most important of all buddhas. He or she is usually shown in paintings being a waterfall or at the foot of a waterfall,” he said. “For me, the garden is the unification of heaven and earth, and water coming from above is a descent from heaven to earth,” Mosko said.
Mosko has his take too on why water calms. The co-author of “Landscape as Spirit: Creating a Contemplative Garden,” he says “Water finds its level, and that’s another important part for a contemplative garden: creating horizontals. Water is a major way of working with horizontality. ”
As falling water seeks a level surface, it cascades. In designing his waterfalls, Mosko always works with an odd number of cascades to avoid inauthentic symmetry. And he seldom makes the fall frontal to the primary point of view.
“To hide a little bit makes it more enticing, similar to doing a portrait of a woman and only showing part of her face,” he said.
Waterfall-owner wannabes can consult books, magazines or water garden centers, where prefab waterfalls are available.
“They are one of more challenging water features to build and incorporate,” said Arneill. “For that reason, there are more products on the market that are already made.” And, he said, “The level of expertise of staff at water-garden centers has certainly elevated in the last few years.”
Flow, naturally, alters the sound conducted by a waterfall.
Mosko said, “In dealing with waterfalls and rivers I think an awful lot about music. Long waterfalls with a single drop fall with a lot of force, and that one step sounds like a toilet flushing. Smaller, multiple cascades sound bright, like a bird song,” Mosko said. “I create a variety of music to experience a constant modulating sound.”
In his book on contemplative gardens, Mosko wrote, “The relationship with water should be personal and intimate.”
He goes so far as to name his waterfalls. An example: “Blessings Come Down.”
Even as, if one pauses to appreciate a waterfall, the relaxation response goes up.
