Country Escape's 2nd pond - Goldfish only

[pondlover]

CE can you tell me who you purchased snails from?

 

[sissy]

she more than likely got them from mr bull frog .He refuses to sell to me for some reason and don't care .I got mine from a local supplier and they were cheaper .

 

[taherrmann4]

Sure wish I could find some good sized rocks CHEAP around here! Or, better yet, wish I had a place to go find them in a creek bed. That would be even better, but all the places I can think of, I would have to walk a long ways with each rock. At my age, I think I would be better off buying them. We shall see. Found 1.5 cu yds of the right size and shape and color but it's a long drive away. They say it's approx 2 ton. Does anyone know if that would be about right? These are the rounder type of rocks, they say 2" to 6", and they want $250. I can get half ton for flagstone for $150, so figured this was well worth it if it really is close to 2 tons. That would be 4 times the other stuff. The flagstone is on a skid, they would deliver it, but it's all flat. I'm tired of flat everywhere. I'll use what I have left in the stream, but want more natural looking river rocks (more rounded) for the edge of the new pond and the top edge of the stream. Also, and this may sound stupid, but I have a 3/4 ton HD truck, 6.5' bed. How much weight could I haul in there? I know more than 3/4 ton, but wondering if a truckload of rock would be too much. I also have my horse trailer, so could easily load it all up in that, but then using more gas, more tire wear, etc. so trying to decide if I go for this deal, if my truck would be able to haul it or if I need to empty the old metal out of my horse trailer (scrap it for money!!!) and take that. Thoughts?

Ce you can haul about 1500 lbs in your truck no problem, you could probably even go to 2000 lbs depending on how far you have to go. I have a 1/2 ton and have had up 1500 lbs in it but I only had to go a few miles. I would take more trips and not push it but that is me.

 

[CountryEscape]

hey they pay big money for mud baths .Softens the skin LOL

OK, Sissy, I'll get the mud ready for you to come take a bath in it. LOL It makes digging at least twice as hard, if not 10 times as hard! To me, digging in dirt is a breeze, digging in mud ... I'll quit before I get started. That takes just too much shoulder and back strength too quickly and I will get tired too soon. I'd rather move mulch and wait and dig on Sunday. That's the plan at this point. Blowing around outside tonight, rained some more today, but still less than an inch in the last few days. However, my ground is saturated, so like walking on a very wet sponge.

 

[sissy]

squishy ground frogs love it .

 

[CountryEscape]

Thanks, Todd. I won't push it. The rocks I found are about 3 hours away, so likely not worth the drive anyhow. I would take my horse trailer, as it could easily haul a ton or two, since it's a 3 horse trailer. Three big horses would be around 3600#. The guy has not responded, though, so I suspect he has sold them already. Will keep looking.
PL, I did buy from Mr. Bullfrog on Ebay. Yes, it's the same guy that would not sell to Sissy, so there was some miscommunication going on there, he must have thought she was someone else, and he never told Sissy what the problem was! I had no trouble with him. He always responded to e-mails quickly, offered to send all large ones if I wanted until he got them out of this pond this spring, and he did send me large ones. They were all the size of a quarter up to the size of a half dollar. And, lots of extras, not including all the babies! The ones in the aquariums are moving around now. One is dead, not sure if one of my fish killed it or what, but the snail meaty part is pulled out. Other ones in the same aquarium are doing fine, though. In the pond, I've seen several that are moving around, but most have disappeared from the shelves, so I suspect they headed toward the bottom . I also put several (about 4 I think) in the waterfall pool, to try to keep the algae out of there, too.
BTW, I have a parrots feather plants in the waterfall pool. It's the green type, I thought it was supposed to be hardy. So far it has not started to grow. Does anyone know if they are hardy for sure (Zone 6 on the new zone charts) and if they just don't come back until later?
And, my water primrose is finally starting to get leaves. Woohoo!

 

[koiguy1969]

i see rocks on craigslist all the time...some free, just get'em out of their yards...

 

[j.w]

CE don't throw out the Parrots Feather yet as sometimes it is slow to start. Mine is all dead looking too every year but then all of a sudden you start to see little green sprouts coming up out of it. Says hardy zones 6 - 10 on the net.

 

[CountryEscape]

OK, the nursery said it was hardy, I specifically asked, because I bought a large pot of it (about 8" pot). I was huge when it went into winter, probably had "arms" from each stem that were 1-2' long each. It pretty much took up most of the pool in the waterfall. When I moved it out to redo the waterfall, the arms fell off, but I even kept them in water while I was working, and put them all back into the pool. So, they were always in water. I'll give them another month or so. At least they are not stinky or anything, so hopefully I will see some growth sooner or later.
My local nursery is opening on Sat., about 2 weeks earlier than usual. I'm hoping they will have some water lettuce and hyacinths growing for sale, but may be too soon yet. I'm going to put them in a floating ring in the goldfish pond, and see if I can get them to grow this year.

 

[sissy]

STINKY HMMMM lol you been sniffing plants or drinking pond water

 

[j.w]

I don't know if I will even bother w/ the water lettuce or water hyacinth here in Western Washington as they never seem to do well here. Anybody else out there in this area have good luck w/ them?

 

[CountryEscape]

Sissy, I figured if the roots and plants stunk, then they were rotten and dead. LOL
The nursery does not have any hyacinths or lettuce yet. I'm only going to try some in the goldfish pond and see if I have any better luck in there than I did in the koi pond last year. But, may have the same problem ... not enough poop yet to keep them going! LOL
It was too muddy to dig, so I got 2 truckloads of mulch (and that was enough to go all the way around my house, and half of the stream and other areas!) and 2 scoops of the pea gravel. So, I'm set to dig tomorrow and see how far I get with the bog. Good news is that I forgot my tarp, so the nursery guy gave me some used landscape fabric, so I think I'll use that as underlayment in the bog! Woohoo!!!

 

[CountryEscape]

I'm hoping to remember to put my aquarium fish outside in the goldfish pond this weekend. Need to use my seine net I got at Wal-Mart ($12 for the same thing that I thought was a good deal on Ebay for $22!!!) and corral all my fish in the big pond to net them and remove the goldfish to the new pond. May do that this afternoon, if it gets warm enough, or I get hot enough digging.
Getting ready to get outside and start digging. May go down the road where the neighbors dumped a bunch of concrete blocks that were on their garage that blew over in the storm last year, and use them on the inside bog wall (between bog and pond) so I don't have to use landscape stones. Figure that dirt will settle and don't want that. Need to build it up at least 8", too. Probably going to have to get more landscape stones, too, since yesterday I used some of the ones I bought for the pond on the outside edge of the stream to hold the mulch in place. Will take lots of pictures today as I progress, and of the bog pipe I put together as well.

 

[sissy]

If you are putting blocks on top of blocks fill them with dirt and I used rebar to pond down the center of them after I off centered each one .Makes it a lot stronger that way .I used the handle of my hammer to pund the dirt down inside the holes in the block .Makes them a lot more solid and stable .Even metal pipe pieces or pvc pipe pounded in the center of the block will work .

 

[j.w]

Wouldn't have guessed that Wal-mart would have seine nets CE. Good deal!