Pond-away-from-pond

[gardengimp]

I mentioned in my intro post that the pond I am currently working on is at our county extension office. It is in the Master Gardener Butterfly/Pollinator Teaching Garden. I volunteered to do a pond makeover project as the fullfillment for my inservice portion of my Master Gardener Training.

As you enter the garden, the very first thing I did is get a Pollinator Zone plaque to go on the gate! Now I just need to get it hung along with the Wildlilfe Habitat plaque.

The garden has been established for many years, and in fact needs some thinning. The predominant color scheme is red and yellow and the preference is for Florida natives or Florida-Friendly. The garden does not get supplemental irrigation. Recently, a very large laurel oak was severely pruned, and much of the garden is now much sunnier than previously. Including my little pond spot!

This is how the pond looked the day I volunteered.

The brown rain barrel is connected to a float valve (under the crooked white pot). There is no actual roof collected rain that falls in the barrel, just rain from the sky. The Master Gardener's keep the rain barrel topped off with tap water when necessary to keep the pond topped off during dry spells. A Smartpond 560 gph submersible pump is in the bottom of the pond with the intake connected to a homemade 2 gallon filter and output to a small water fountain. The pump is connected to a timer so that the pump can be shut down during the middle of the day during the summer (???).

The pond itself is a preform in sand. Our native soil is sand. It is not level, but I see no indication of water getting under the preform. I can't find my measurements now, but the pond is roughly 7' x 4' or so, with a shelf all around the inside stepping down to a deeper section. There are reportedly 4 lilies in the pond that are not potted. The pond is full of gambusia and one lone gold fish. Poor guy, he needs some company. In time ....

My goals and objectives:
- make the pond area 10x10 look much better by our fall MG event
- adhere to the butterfly/pollinator Florida Native/Friendly theme of the garden
- minimize maintenance requirements
- make the pond as error free as possible and able to run on it's own for weeks at a time if needed
- move the pump and mechanical filtration to a position that can easily be cleaned by any Master Gardener volunteer regardless of physical abilities and/or knowledge
- improve the water life conditions inside the pond
- do all of this with minimal cash outlay since our county like most others across the country is broke

Oh, and I did mention that my garden pond experience is just barely past beginner????

Alrighty, here is the concept drawing I included in my project plan:

And the pump box, which is not actually what I am now planning since I've gotten myself some ed-u-ma-cation reading Addy's how to bog thread. Briefly, I'm changing the outflow from the tub to the bog to pipes instead of free fall drips.

Over on GW, waterbug's comment was to keep the bog and loose the pump tub. My goal for the pump box is to make the mechanical cleaning part of the job easily doable by anybody regardless of their physical abilities or lack thereof. A skimmer would be nice, but it's not in the budget. Fortunately, with the laurel oak on its way out the leaf drop is not very bad.

This is what the pond area looked like the day before I took my mini vacation at the local hospital.

The concrete block was salvaged from around the garden and right now is just eye-balled leveled. The next step in construction is to get the block border leveled and more sand dug out from the inside. The bog will be the area from the edge of the concrete block to the preform. It will be built using scrap pieces of EPDM I have. And a boat load of EPDM patch tape and PL Roofing Flashing Sealer.

Here is a rough sketch of the planting plan. As well I have a bunch of mondo grass and society garlic that will help to fill in and soften the edges of the preform.

Oh, and I have got a black milk crate that I am cutting the ends of and covering with EPDM to cover the float valve. To sit on top of the float valve cover, I'm crafting a fairy toad house garden patch, complete with toad house, palm tree water station, gazing pond, pink flamingo, shell path and rubber boots. Because after all, fairies wear boots.

This is the plant list I've come up with.
Bacopa caroliniana

Blue bacopa, Lemon bacopa
- host plant
- native​

Canna flaccida

Florida Yellow Canna Lily, Golden Canna
- host plant
- native​

Colocasia esculenta 'Fontanesii'

Black Stem Taro, Black Stem Elephant Ear
- growing 4 - 8’ tall provides perches for dragonflies​

Hibiscus coccineus or Hibiscus grandiflorus

Swamp Hibiscus, Scarlet rose mallow
- host plant
- native​

Juncus

Corkscrew Rush
- native​

Iris hexagona

Louisiana Black Iris​

Iris virginica

Blue Flag Iris​

Liatris spicata

Blazing star​

- nectar plant
- native​

Lobelia cardinalis

Cardinal Flower
- nectar plant
- native​

Lythrum alatum

Loosestrife
- native​

Ophiopogon japonicus

Mondo Grass (Green & Variegated)​

Pontederia cordata

Blue Pickerel
- native​

Tulbaghia violacea

Society Garlic​

I've gotten starts and divisions from other gardeners, and ordered some seeds. Have a mini aqua nursery going out in the back of my veggie patch, hoping to get a head start on growth.

Hmm, well ... that is about it for now I think. Did I mention I'm practically a beginner? So fire away with any suggestions, comments, critiques and what have yous.

 

[sissy]

Sounds great but found out something and I have had a problem now with for weeks is that dead roots fall away and are constantly clogging my pump and stopping it from working and no prefilter works with those fine hair roots for long .I did find that in making hanging plant pockets out of window screening just slightly bigger than the pot still gave the roots room to grow but stopped some of the clogging of the pump .I used fishing wire to make them





I hung them off the edge of the pond with a window screen tail and the ones that were in the pond I just made them cozies to sit in .Solved the problem of stray roots .I got the idea from a pond I saw at lowes that had rubber plant hangers

 

[gardengimp]

That's a cool idea, thanks sissy!

 

[gardengimp]

What's going on at the Pond-away-from-pond?

The block along the two sides has been dug in, leveled and backfilled. Blocks are in place for the rain barrel and the pump tub. Liner for the right side and back side have been seamed and the right side is in place and holding water! Huzzah! The left side sand has been rain settled and hand finished and has cardboard layers to protect the sand from too much run-off. Over the next few days, I'll get the rain barrel emptied and moved to it's new spot so that I can lay the back side liner full across and start the seam of the back to the left.

Pipe is cut and layed in place, some of the pump fittings are assembled, going for the tub and cat litter on Friday. Will build the tub with fittings out over this week end.

I think I am going to test water flow first with the pump still in the pond. Still thinking on that. I do know that I don't plan to put the gravel in the bog until I'm sure the seams don't leak. The seams are at the right and left corner, and I adjusted the ground level in those spots so that the seams are not actually underwater. So, here is hoping ....

I haven't seen the one lonely goldfish my last few trips down here. I came down last weekend and found the water saucer tumbled into the pond. So I'm afraid the coon's have found the spot again. I am thinking about setting up one of those folding garden fences on top of the block border. I think that might help with the wild-life and will also help a bit to prevent accidental walking of people and kids into the bog.

Ah - reminder - this is the pond in one of the teaching gardens at our county extension office. I can't wait to get this finished, it is just such an ugly duckling right now. We need for it to be looking really spiffy by our annual event on Oct. 6.

Oh, teaser - I'm building a floating faerie island. It's coming along really neat. I'll have to take it out to a table tomorrow and get a picture.

Lastly, I changed the timer on the pump. The pump now runs 24 hours a day. Electricity and money is not an issue. Knowledge is good.

 

[gardengimp]

Seaming.

PL Roofing & Flashing has a new look. It seems to be the same product, just new packaging. Threw me for a loop.

So, like most county agencies, our county has no spare change. So I volunteered the lining for the wrap around bog. Knowing that I had a bunch of pieces. Here is how I did it the right hand to back side seam. And any comments please let me know because I haven't done the left side yet!

I took my two pieces and a some chalk down to the pond. I laid them out in the bog and used my chalk to mark where they would overlap.

Back home on my driveway, I streched out the liner, lined up the chalk marks and got to work.

- clean the liner both sides really good. Water, soap, acetone.
- I put down a strip of doubled sided carpet tape just to hold things in place while I worked.
- get the gear ready: 2 pairs nylon gloves, nippers, metal wire, screw, cheap caulk gun, saran wrap, rubber band
- put two pairs of nylon gloves on both of your hands, nip the end of the tube, stick the wire down to break the seal
- lay out a continuous bead of sealant. I did overlapping beads on each side of the liner

When you are finished, stick the screw in the tube, wrap some saran wrap around tightly, rubber band, then stick in the freezer.

The next day, I went back to work. Take the tube out of the freezer and go set it in the sun. Turn the liner over exposing the bottom seam. Cut a piece of liner to cover the bottom seam. Repeat go to work steps on this 'patch' that covers the bottom seam edge.

The next day, I went back to work. I turned the liner back over so that up was the top side. I used the EPDM Pond Liner Repair to seal the seam edge. I rolled the stuff on good, then stomped on it, then set a bag of rock on it for the next 24 hours.

I double-dog-dare this seam to leak. Actually, it isn't even underwater, so it sure as shootin' better not leak!

 

[addy1]

Sounds like you are doing a fine job at seaming!

 

[gardengimp]

The next stage in the progress of the pond away from pond was testing the water tightness of the u-shaped liner that surrounds three sides of the pond. I was sweating bullets on this one. It is easy enough with a pond outside your own door to go and check if things are going OK. And heck, we've had our own share of oopsies at home that have nearly drained our pond, so doing something like this away from home had me a bit nervous.

But look ma! No leaks!

The liner is in place, the pipes are in place and drilled, and held water for several days.

Then I got really brave and stuck the outflow from the pump into the pipe system! I did move the pump to one of the ledges, so the pond can't be drained dry in the event of a leak. The good news is ---- no immediately observable leaks!

I have one spot at the low side of the preform that I measured and spliced incorrectly. The liner was not wide enough in this one spot to hang over the side of the preform. I waited for a dry day with no rain in the forecast, pumped some water out of the pond, and sealed and seamed like a crazy woman with the PL. On our next county purchases trip to the big box store I will pick up some pond repair to affix over this spot. Just for some extra insurance against leakages.

 

[gardengimp]

The big day finally arrived! We have 3/8 River Jacks for the bog! I recruited a helper to split the transport load. Neither one of us was comfortable with the idea of 30 bags of river jacks in our vehicle. As it turned out, we ended up just buying 20 bags. Our county purchasing system is going through a change and the extension agent in charge decided he would rather us make two trips than to have excess left over from one trip. I knew I needed somewhere between 20 - 30 bags but I'm not that good with the exact calcuations.

At any rate, we went, we purchased. Our unloader, haulers and dumpers crew didn't show up. I'm slowly learning to adjust my expectations in the land of volunteerism. At any rate, my fellow transporter unloaded all 20 bags. Bless his heart, I should bring him something really special. Using my hand truck, I was able to get 12 bags unloaded into the bog. The back inside corner is just a bit too tight to fit crutch, me and hand truck, so I will need to beg & borrow some helpers for the last 8 bags.

I unplugged the pond pump while I worked. I dumped the bags of gravel straight into the bog area. Got them dumped in and semi- leveled and spread. Then I removed one of the concrete border blocks on the low spot of each side. The turned the water hose on, stuck the hose in the pipe stand and let her run. She ran and ran gritty dirty water. Finally, I decided the water was running out more clear then dirty, so I stopped the water hose. Put the bog sides back in place and started the pump up. When I left for the day, the pond was looking sadly cloudy. I held my breath.

Actually, I expected the cloudiness to eventually clear up. I wasn't sure how long it would take. I left the pond mid afternoon, then dropped by again at dusk to check on it. It was still cloudy at dusk.

The next day? Not only was the cloudy cleared up; but - for the first time in years - this pond has been in place for a long time - you can see below the surface of the water. I am just floored how a bog filter cleared this water in just under 24 hours. Floored, and totally pleased! Pea soup? Gone.

Next step, plants planted into the bog. Oh, and get the pump tub finished and installed. And to decide if I want all of the out flow from the pump going into the bog, or if I want to split part off for a trickle falls type thing.

 

[addy1]

YEAH! another Bog lover, you are now officially a green rate pond! (without the green............water lol) Fantastic, so glad it worked for you. Mine has been wonderful.

I have all my flow going into the bog, but splitting it would work great too. We have a separate pump for the stream (real high head pressure)
My water tests are always perfect it works so well.