What About A Wooden Bridge For Your water garden?

When I think of bridges I always think of water ...  and I never could resist stopping the car to look over the bridge when I crossed what appeared to be an interesting trout stream ... bridges create an aura of mystery, romance, far away places somehow or at least they do to me. You know so many gardens and ponds could benefit from this feature.

What prompted me to write about bridges was information I received from Rod Bird who owns a company called Redwood Bridges in Fresno, California. I found the information extremely appropriate and thought it worth sharing with you since it brings out important points to be aware of when thinking of buying that bridge to span your pond, creek, or stream.

His point about span length is particularly important as also is the use of stainless steel fittings as distinct from galvanized .... nothing is worse than trying to remove a corroded nut and bolt or screw. To me this means stainless steel fittings are not a luxury they are essential. Here's Rod's story with thanks to Rod for taking the trouble to contact me ... by the way here are his contact details for those folk in the US looking to buy a personally designed and built Redwood bridge (Rod has told me his prices cannot be beaten and that he personally guarantees total satisfaction and a full money back guarantee) ... Contact Rod on 559-272-6155, take a look at his prices at http://www.Birdweb1.com

He seems like one of those really nice people to me.

California Redwood Span Bridge Information by Rod Bird:

Wooden bridges have been used for many centuries for things such as draw bridges, for spanning crevices, over creeks, ponds, gulleys and in fact anywhere to cross over low areas such as valleys, dips and depressions as well as water of course.

Japan started making wooden arch bridges many decades ago to beautify and maintain Koi ponds and water gardens ... I'm sure you have all seen those appealing pictures of Japanese gardens all of which incorporate a wooden span bridge.Other parts of the world caught on during the last 20 years or so.

The wooden arch bridge is usually made of cedar, pine, douglas fir and a few places use the more durable and weather, insect and water resistant California Redwood.  We use only 100% California Redwood to build our Redwood Pond Bridges to assure many years of use and beauty.

When looking for a Pond bridge, you should know exactly how long the bridge will span. Some bridge builders sell an 8 ft bridge but it will actually only span about 6 1/2 ft.

You should also make sure the bridge is made of weather and water resistant wood or sealed and stained, along with stainless steel hardware such as bolts, washer, nuts and screws. We use only stainless steel hardware in all our bridges and on all our bridges we measure the span length that it will span and not the arch length.

You should try to find a bridge that is very easily assembled and only a few tools required. We number and label each board, each post and rail and you just match the numbers and put in the screws and tighten. It takes an average of 20 minutes to assemble our bridges.