Country Escape's 2nd pond - Goldfish only

[pondlover]

CE - where are some new pictures???? LOL I know that you've worked on your pond this weekend.

 

[CountryEscape]

Ok, I left to meet up with a fellow ponder from the area, and didn't get home until late, so here we go with the pics. Since I didn't get to dig on the bog on Sat., it didn't get totally done yesterday, but I will finish it evenings this week.
I got the skimmer dug in. I was not sure until yesterday where I was going to put the skimmer, thus never left a "shelf" for it. Besides, I'm terrible with leveling things, so figured the water level would be far easier to use as my level. This skimmer is pretty small, and the 1000 gph pump works fine for just the skimmer (it says no more than 1000 gph), but when I tried to hook up the stream with the outlet, the skimmer barely worked. Was it too far to push the water? I have extra tubing attached, as I didn't want to cut it to check the power, so maybe that's part of it.

First I spread out the liner, to measure and make sure (again) how wide the bog could be ...

Then I rolled up the liner to keep it out of my way

Then I started digging the bog.

And, for fun, here are a couple of tulips I found blooming, when I was spreading mulch in my flower beds. There should have been about 50 of these yellow and red tulips in the front beds, and only this one came back. I'm really sad about that! Have no idea why the others didn't come back.

Tonight I HAVE to mow my grass, which is quite tall! Should have mowed during the week (less than a week since last mowing) but it rained and was too wet. Will have to sweep it, but the horses love the grass clippings, especially since they are off of the pasture for now, since I seeded it a few weeks ago.
I promise to post more pics of the PVC tubing and how I put them all together. Addy, did you glue yours, or just put them together with the connectors? I have caps I'm going to try using on the flush out ends, hoping that just pushing them in place will keep them put. Maybe put a rock on top of them to be certain. That way I can remove the cap to flush when necessary. Anxious to get the bog completed! May have to use my bigger pump to run the stream and bog, and let the skimmer pump simply do the skimmer and a fountain.

 

[j.w]

Thanks for posting the pix CE and you are making good progress and everything looks so nice and neat. I love that yellow/red tulip!
Our garden guy on the radio said lots of times tulips won't come back unless you fertilize them a bunch. Sometimes even then they choose not to appear again. Daffodils are great at coming back and making more little ones each year.

 

[sissy]

They have bulb food and if you put it on you get more and more flowers every year .I planted only 6 tulips 4 years ago and now I have huge bunches of them .

 

[pondlover]

CE it looks great. Your bog is going to be a very nice size. We put a threaded adapter on our flush out end piece. Seems like the force of the water pushing through the pipes might blow the cap off? I love that we decided to put the bog in and wish already that we had made it bigger. :razz:
I love watching other progress and can get more ideas for my own. Love this ponding addiction! :banana:

 

[taherrmann4]

CE can't tell how deep your creek is, but be careful as it doesn't look to deep and once you get water flowing be cautious about a dam that could form from leaves or debris that might blow into it then forcing the water outside the liner.

 

[CountryEscape]

Todd, you are so correct about the creek! I thought about one of my dogs laying across it in the heat of the summer and the water flowing around and out! I will make it deeper before I get it up and running. I'm still planning to put a water wheel at the end before the pond, and since that is a separate liner, I can pull it up from either end and adjust the depth, etc. as I go. I think I will try to have a small "pooling" area at the end, so the water wheel will be in more than a few inches of water. That way the wind may not be as likely to play havoc with it and spin it the wrong way!
Thanks, JW and PL, I'm really liking the bog! It is 3' wide all the way around, and I think about 15' long, It will end up to be at least 24" deep, as right now it's 18", and the bog will be a little bit higher than the edge of the pond. Now I have to do the edge between the bog and pod so hopefully this time it will be more level with the water level, unlike my other pond which is not. And, I've asked the neighbors, and they said I can have as many of their old ceramic blocks that I want that came from their 2 car garage that was blown over last year in a storm. They dumped them in a ditch, and I asked if I could have a few, and they said, "Take as may as you want!" Woohoo! They are really cool, I love the old stuff, but since I've already gone with the landscaping stones, I will stay with that theme around the outside, but these will work really well on the edge between bog and pond. I'll get some of them tomorrow after work and get back to working on it.
The PVC pipe I got was in 10' sections, and since the bog is a curve, and I want to put 2 pipes in it, I will need probably a 45 degree connector on the curve. And, in answer to your questions about the cap, I intend to have the capped end coming up from the bottom, to the top edge of the pea gravel. My thought is to then be able to direct the flow of water when I want to drain them out (if necessary). I'll put a rock on top of each of the caps so they should be fine without the glue. If I need to, I can easily swap the caps for screw plugs.

 

[CometKeith]

Country, Your bog is going to be amazing. A few years back I saw a pond with a large bog and the only filtering that was done were water hyacinths in the bog. ..and they had a very large pond (converted swimming pool) with a lot of Koi.

 

[CountryEscape]

Thanks, Keith. I'm hoping that the bog will be all I need for filtration, like what Addy has on her pond.
I'm hoping the goldfish will leave the water hyacinths alone, and they can be in their pond to help shade it. But, if they cause problems, one end of the bog will have standing water, so will put them in there as well. That's where I finally learned to put the ones I got last year, in my koi bog, and they at least survived, although didn't bloom much. You have all goldfish, Keith, do you have luck with hyacinths in your pond? At first I thought they were nibbling on the lilies I put in there, but turns it out was the tiny variety I planted, and they are very small yet. Whew! I did throw in some of the water primrose, just in case they were wanting to nibble on stuff. Not much algae in there yet, so have been feeding them once a day. At least the new ones have finally figured out to eat, since the little guys I moved into there already know what the food is. In fact, while I was working on the bog, they were actually coming to the surface like they were asking for food. They were pretty skittish in the beginning, so I'm happy they are getting to know me better now.

 

[CountryEscape]

It will be this weekend before I get more time to work on the bog and new goldfish pond, but tonight I finished cleaning out the last wheelbarrow of dirt. Then I went an picked up the 12" long ceramic blocks that the neighbors dumped in a ditch. Their garage blew down last spring, and they didn't want them. They told me I could have as many as I wanted! I wish I could figure out something to build with them, and am considering the base for the water wheel for starters. If I had them available sooner, I would have used them for the outside edge of my pond. Anyhow, they are 4x6 and then 12" long, so I plan to put them on edge on the wall in between the goldfish pond and bog. I'll still have enough ledge to put a rock to hide the liner from the pond side (something I messed up on when I dug the other bog). AND, I splurged and bought some rock to use on the new pond. I figured I saved money in not buying a new puppy, when the pup got dumped at my house several weeks ago, so using that part of my tax refund that I was saving for that and bought some rock. I know I won't be patient enough to wait to go looking for rocks. This way I can at least get the pond top edge lined and then fill it the rest of the way.
I'm really anxious to get back to working on it, tempted to take another day off work, but figured better save my days off for bigger and better things throughout the year.

 

[j.w]

Don't worry you will get it done and it will look fine w/ all the hard work you're putting into it. Neat that you get all those blocks for free. I didn't get outside today at all. Got a darn tetanus shot yesterday and my left arm is hurting. Figured it would be done hurting today but no it's still bothering me. Hopefully it will be better tomorrow but then I suppose the rains will come then, darn!

 

[CountryEscape]

JW, I know tetnus is not like other shots, but I used to get allergy shots twice a week (two shots each time) and they told me best thing if the arm got sore was to use it! Kind of like other sore muscles, best to keep them active until the soreness goes away. Good luck with that! Sorry your arm is sore. :-(

 

[CountryEscape]

Yippee! Looks like I will be working on the bog evenings after all! I had told a friend to come see my pond, but have major house cleaning to do first, and now he's not coming until at least week from this weekend! Woohoo, let the house stay cluttered, I have a bog and pond to finish. I should be able to easily get the inside wall leveled and blocks put in, liner pulled over and maybe some pea gravel rinsed the next couple of nights. Then I will be ready to put the finishing touches on the outer edges and fill the pond the rest of the way. Woohoo!!! I can see it getting completed now for sure by this weekend.
Had a mouse in my toaster this morning. Cat found it. LOL Dead mouse now, but running behind because of that fiasco, otherwise I would run out and take pics of the ceramic blocks that I'll be using on the inside wall (under the liner) for height. Will take pics and post them this evening.

 

[pondlover]

YEAH.... CE I'm so excited to see what your finished pond will look like. Mine has turned a not very nice shade of green in just a matter of hours yesterday. I know its because the temps have been in the 80s and my lilies are not big enough to provide enough shade. I'm trying to be patient. I really liked it when it was clear. :razz:

 

[CountryEscape]

It will change. I had that last year, too, PL. Be patient, and know that at least the green water is not hurting the fish. Someone said it's actually a healthy environment, we humans just don't like it.