I’m not sure how I stumbled on Make Your Own Bird Bath, videos on YouTube, but I did. I watched people make bird baths with cement, plastic totes, and some with large leaves. I didn’t want to chop up my beloved plants, I was going to go with plastic totes, but I wanted a bowl shape, not a rectangle.
I started thinking about some of the things I have around the home I could use. I wanted a large bowl for the bird bath and my Bosu Ball came to mind. It was perfect.
With my spouses help, I covered the Bosu Ball in garbage bags and laid out a couple garbage bags to protect the garage floor. I used a ready made bag of cement that just needed water. I dumped the cement into a bucket adding the water a little at a time until it was the consistency I wanted (I didn’t measure anything). I wish I had taken more photos of the process but I couldn’t find my camera and wanted to get started. The mound in the photo didn’t look like this right away. After piling all the cement onto the garbage bag covered Bosu Ball it was very cracked and I was really nervous because it didn’t seem like enough cement. I had to gently pat the cement pile and slowly the cracks blended together. My spouse also ran a paint brush with a bit of water on it to help smooth it all out until it looked like it does on the photo.
I’m not sure where I got the idea that you can remove it from the mold (mould?) after 48 hours, but I ended up waiting an extra day. I’m glad I did. After 48 hours the cement pile still wasn’t the light colour it is now. It still had dark looking wet patches, even though it felt dry. I was really scared of it cracking when we pried it off the Bosu Ball. The cement layer seemed very thin. If I had more cement I have used it. We had to use a crow bar to pry the cement off the ball and I was worried it would get damaged. I wouldn’t use the Bosu Ball again, even though it turned out so good because they are really expensive. I’m sure there are much better items that I could use that would be less upsetting if they were ruined.
Everything did turn out pretty good and nothing was damaged. I love how it turned out.
There are some issues. Because I used a garbage bag, the creases in the bag went into the cement and made it look like cracks, but that makes it look antique and gives it character. If you aren’t into that look and want to try this, possibly a large bowl piled over with sand would be a better option. Also, if you look closely, you can see pieces of the bag stuck in the cracks that will be super hard to get out.
I’m also not sure if the bowl is water tight. I’ve put a couple buckets of water in it and I’ll check on it tomorrow. I’ll forgive it if it’s not. I love how it turned out even if it ends up being a lawn bowl and not a bird bath.
Here’s a photo of the bowl with my spouses feet for size comparison.
Lobster Shorts 