The work around the pond continues! I have high hopes that it will be complete and ready to enjoy this Spring!
We finished one of the surrounding areas. The grass was destroyed by all the piles and pallets of rocks. Since it was a blank slate, I didn't feel bad about continuing the drainage ditch that goes around the end and side of the pond. When it rains, we used to get a lot of standing water. Now it runs into that rock filled ditch and continues to the edge of the yard, where it can percolate into the hill. Since we don't want to fool with the mower in that spot, we filled the whole thing with egg rock. It will serve as an area for chairs or maybe even a fire-bowl. (Note - in the photos, that big piece of plywood was for me to roll my wheelbarrow over the trench.) In the finished product, the one flat rock in the middle looks sort of weird - but we had one leftover and decided to just use it there.
I had a huge pile of field stones from our old stone wall. (Neighbor's tree fell on it and we had it re-built - but lower - so there were lots of leftover stones. I made a little low stone wall (decorative dividing line, really, not structural at all) to edge the back border of the yard. (You can see it in the last photo - the one with the bluebird house.)
We are going to get some sod squares to fill in the bare dirt spots.
We have been getting after the carpenter bees in the swing frame! That is a little bit fun, in a sadistic sort of way. I feel bad killing anything, but they just destroy things!!!!! The top beam of the frame was really riddled with holes so we took it down and replaced it. (When we cut it in half to make it fit in the truck to take to the dump, the entire post was BUZZING! That was freaky!
We are going to fill in the holes in the side posts and stain the whole thing (which we should have done long ago.)
I also dug a trench from the pond overflow area. (No photos of this yet.) It will direct the water runoff out to the end of the yard. I'm going to line it with landscape fabric and fill it with egg rock, then fold the landscape fabric over the top. We will put some large flat stepping stones on top, set down far enough that we can run the mower over everything.
Once we get a porch swing to hang out there, it will be DONE!
I have some algae growing in the bog. I think that is a sign that Spring is on the way. It is super cold this weekend but I think it might be the last cold snap! (Fingers crossed!)
We finished one of the surrounding areas. The grass was destroyed by all the piles and pallets of rocks. Since it was a blank slate, I didn't feel bad about continuing the drainage ditch that goes around the end and side of the pond. When it rains, we used to get a lot of standing water. Now it runs into that rock filled ditch and continues to the edge of the yard, where it can percolate into the hill. Since we don't want to fool with the mower in that spot, we filled the whole thing with egg rock. It will serve as an area for chairs or maybe even a fire-bowl. (Note - in the photos, that big piece of plywood was for me to roll my wheelbarrow over the trench.) In the finished product, the one flat rock in the middle looks sort of weird - but we had one leftover and decided to just use it there.
I had a huge pile of field stones from our old stone wall. (Neighbor's tree fell on it and we had it re-built - but lower - so there were lots of leftover stones. I made a little low stone wall (decorative dividing line, really, not structural at all) to edge the back border of the yard. (You can see it in the last photo - the one with the bluebird house.)
We are going to get some sod squares to fill in the bare dirt spots.
We have been getting after the carpenter bees in the swing frame! That is a little bit fun, in a sadistic sort of way. I feel bad killing anything, but they just destroy things!!!!! The top beam of the frame was really riddled with holes so we took it down and replaced it. (When we cut it in half to make it fit in the truck to take to the dump, the entire post was BUZZING! That was freaky!
We are going to fill in the holes in the side posts and stain the whole thing (which we should have done long ago.)
I also dug a trench from the pond overflow area. (No photos of this yet.) It will direct the water runoff out to the end of the yard. I'm going to line it with landscape fabric and fill it with egg rock, then fold the landscape fabric over the top. We will put some large flat stepping stones on top, set down far enough that we can run the mower over everything.
Once we get a porch swing to hang out there, it will be DONE!
I have some algae growing in the bog. I think that is a sign that Spring is on the way. It is super cold this weekend but I think it might be the last cold snap! (Fingers crossed!)
