Here we go -- FINALLY! A pond for wildlife...

[bagsmom]

Today we cut down a redbud tree that was crowding out a dogwood and making a lot of mess with seed pods. I asked Ed Beaulieu (The Pond Professor) if he thought redbud wood would be ok in the pond and he thought so! I am excited to use some or all of these in the bog and pond!

 

[GBBUDD]

I have another idea - and yet another amazingly professional (not) engineering drawing.
I am going to have a lot of the black flexible PVC left. I had been thinking I might want some extra water movement down at the far end, to help push water in the direction of the intake bay.
I have a 3000 gph pump. If I were to put in a Y as shown in the yellow highlighted area, I could snake the black pipe behind the waterfall rocks and run it down to the end of the pond. I could install a valve to control the flow.
BUT -- is the 3,000 gph pump enough to do all that? I know I don't want a fast flow through the bog.
Is this a good idea? Is it even do-able, given the size of my pump?
View attachment 150404

What your idea is if nothing else is a way to change the flow in your pond for a while instead of the flow being at the surface from the waterfall of the bog you can then by pass most of the flow to the bog leave a trickle going really slowing down the contact time in the bog yet . Allowing you to throw the flow at the bottom of the pond a way of vacuuming without. it will help to eliminate any dead spots. so i say hell yeah.

 

[GBBUDD]

Just need to know elevation change from pond water level to bog water level and about how much pipe there will be to get from the pump to the bottom of the bog. And size of pipe—assuming 2” pvc?

She has no worries there is next to no head PRESSURE in her design. there's no real height difference

 

[combatwombat]

She has no worries there is next to no head PRESSURE in her design. there's no real height difference

Depends on the pump and what’s desired at the bog.

 

[bagsmom]

I think the whole project is going to be a big experiment! At least with the valves, I can play around with the water flow to the different sections.
Today, after taking down the tree and getting all the limbs and branches cut and hauled down to the street, I was pooped. I went out and tried to play with rocks a little bit but I was just too tired to be creative. Maybe Monday I will make some good progress!

 

[bagsmom]

For my Mother's Day, I got the gift of bog plumbing! And I got to see my favorite bird mama bring her babies out to visit!

 

[GBBUDD]

COMING ALONE NICELY..... all your planning shows. its nice to see this finally coming together for you

 

[bagsmom]

Here is an update on work. It is really hard to get an idea of scale and angle in the pictures, but I will post them anyway.
I spent yesterday on the bog. I put a piece of liner under the centipede and snorkel. I got to thinking that the texture of the overlay won't let stuff slide down to the clean out snorkel. The liner is nice and slick. My son helped me get the big rocks, medium rocks, and most of the egg rock. We gathered them, washed them down, and placed them. He was a lot of help!
Today I finished the egg rock and then filled the rest with pea gravel. I used almost the entire bag (one bulldozer scoop) of pea gravel!!!!! There will be a LOT of surface area for bacteria in there.
There is a shot looking down the snorkel and it is working!!!! Just the moisture from the wet gravel is seeping right down to the lowest point!!!!
The second to the last picture shows another fish cave. I decided to use some of the halved culvert pipe.
The last picture is a shot of the intake bay progress. I have mostly done the main rocking up to the water level. I need to get rocks to put on top of the aqua blocks.
Of course, the rock work everywhere is still basic and rough. I will fill in with smaller rocks and foam in gravel to disguise the voids.
Progress is still slow, but it is slowly happening!

 

[combatwombat]

You’ve been busy!

 

[GBBUDD]

So your doing a cross between the two types of bogs I must have missed that posts . You placed them all over had me spinning a bit. So you did the snorkel centipede with the larger gravel and pea gravel no aquablocks . But you mentioned you set them what were they in the pump vault in a intake bay ?

Really coming along beautifully @bagsmom

OK @YShahar the gauntlet has been thrown .

 

[bagsmom]

So your doing a cross between the two types of bogs I must have missed that posts . You placed them all over had me spinning a bit. So you did the snorkel centipede with the larger gravel and pea gravel no aquablocks . But you mentioned you set them what were they in the pump vault in a intake bay ?

Relay coming along beutifuly @bagsmom

OK @YShahar the gauntlet has been thrown .

Yes! I am trying a weird little hybrid. I'm doing the bog somewhat like Ozponds, with the half culvert pipe and full culvert pipe put together - no aqua blocks. I like the idea of having the upright white pvc to shoot out funky water -- AND the snorkel to drop in a submersible pump to pump out crud. It is probably overkill, but what the heck - I will give it a try. Also, in the absence of aqua blocks, I thought I would try using the half culvert pipe as a mini settling chamber. It may be too small of a space for it to actually function that way, but we will see what happens. (See my drawing.)
Yes, the aqua blocks are in the intake bay.
I am sooooo tired today! But it was a productive day!
Thanks again for the encouragement!

 

[Lisak1]

So fun to see this in progress! And I'm barely tired at all!

 

[bagsmom]

I'm just taking a break to go to confession. I did it again. I pulled back the liner and carved out the end of the pond some more. I keep looking at all that liner and thinking "I can go bigger!" I didn't do a ton - but there was an area that was bugging me. Also, I am avoiding rocking some of the problem areas. I think my go-to stress coping mechanism is digging holes.

 

[GBBUDD]

Some of my favorite areas are those I have rhree feet of liner I can make a little planting area for pitcher plants or moss some rich slimy soil for those hard to grow plants . Makes the big picture much more realistic

 

[combatwombat]

I'm just taking a break to go to confession. I did it again. I pulled back the liner and carved out the end of the pond some more. I keep looking at all that liner and thinking "I can go bigger!" I didn't do a ton - but there was an area that was bugging me. Also, I am avoiding rocking some of the problem areas. I think my go-to stress coping mechanism is digging holes.

I feel so guilty every time I trim the liner! Keep diggin'!