At the end of August I talked about how we managed our computer game time. In that post I mentioned how my son needs to earn his computer time over and above the 1 hour he gets to play daily. It's sometimes hard to come up with things for him to do, and we've been working on getting him motivated.. over the past week he's been very diligent about working on the new pond.
You may recall that back in June my son made a small pond with a friend. He did an excellent job with it, but it was...in a couple of different ways not satisfactory.
1. the toads kept escaping.
2. the space between it and the rose of sharon bush was tight making it hard to navigate the back yard
3. the pond just wasn't quite big enough...his pond fish were a tad crowded and
4. all the plants he put in it were "mom.. they are just too big now mom!"
You may recall that back in June my son made a small pond with a friend. He did an excellent job with it, but it was...in a couple of different ways not satisfactory.
1. the toads kept escaping.
2. the space between it and the rose of sharon bush was tight making it hard to navigate the back yard
3. the pond just wasn't quite big enough...his pond fish were a tad crowded and
4. all the plants he put in it were "mom.. they are just too big now mom!"
So we thought that perhaps a bigger pond was in order. We'd need a couple of supplies.. like a pond liner and eventually an outdoor pump (still need to find that).
At the end of July/beginning August I found a pond liner on sale and said okay.. here's the liner. Let's get building, we considered a few different spots but finally ended up with right beside the old one, using up an flower garden that I've been unsuccessfully battling weeds in.
At the end of July/beginning August I found a pond liner on sale and said okay.. here's the liner. Let's get building, we considered a few different spots but finally ended up with right beside the old one, using up an flower garden that I've been unsuccessfully battling weeds in.
| My son had me take this picture to send to our international student to show himself hard at work. The student promised to help our son finish it when he got here, but the lad had it mostly all done before he arrived. All he needed to do was help us put the liner in yesterday. |  |
So what do you think? Did we do good? Think the fish will be happier now? Think it will be easier to raise toads and frogs and encourage snakes to come around? That's what we are hoping for. :) We have some pond liner left over that the lad is saying.. Mom.. can I use this to make a couple smaller ponds? For the toads I don't want to have them escape? Think I can mom?
I'm figuring we probably have room along the side fence for a couple of smaller ponds. :) We plan in the spring to put flowers and plants in that will lean down into the water, and put in some flowering plants around the edges a bit. Possibly throw a water lily or two in there along with some pond plants. Tomorrow (Wednesday) we hope to catch our fish and crayfish and show them their new abode (though that might have to wait until Thursday evening).
I'm figuring we probably have room along the side fence for a couple of smaller ponds. :) We plan in the spring to put flowers and plants in that will lean down into the water, and put in some flowering plants around the edges a bit. Possibly throw a water lily or two in there along with some pond plants. Tomorrow (Wednesday) we hope to catch our fish and crayfish and show them their new abode (though that might have to wait until Thursday evening).
It's supposed to rain today which is one of the reasons we didn't fill it all the way up (besides it was getting late and didn't want to risk forgetting the tap on).
Let me give you a quick run down on how we did it. The goal had been for the pond to stretch along the fence, but we ran into an issue with an old sewer cover (at least that's what we think it is). That cover didn't allow us to dig down deep enough. So with went with coming out into the patio area. The back half and one side are about 2.5 feet deep, and the front corner is about 12 inches deep. This gives frog/toad eggs and little fishes a place to slip away from bigger fish.
We cut away all the roots really short, cleaned out all the rocks and added a layer of sand from our old sandbox to the bottom. The lad doesn't use the sandbox anymore so we figured we'd might as well make good use of that sand. The lad took a good amount of time making it as smooth as possible.
The stones around the top are from our old rose garden/small pond. We have a piece of wood in the new pond as already small finches have slide on the plastic in their attempt to get down to the water. We don't want birds drowning in it. Hopefully the wood will help. We may need to make a small island of some sort. We saw those at a pond place in London and that gave us ideas of our own to try to recreate.
My son has learned
1. A big project is made smaller if you just work at it for 30 minutes at a time.
2. Asking for help doesn't mean you aren't doing the job, just means you are asking for help with things you can't figure on your own.
3. Things work best sometimes with a team (mom, international student, lad and sometimes dad). We couldn't have gotten the liner in all by ourselves, it took a team.
4. Paying attention to detail matters when it comes to making an area smooth.
5. To use the right tool for the job. sometimes he needed a spade, other times a square edge shovel and sometimes a trowel was the best tool.
Anyways, that's T for Making Time.... our new pond. This post is part of a series from Marcy at Ben And Me. You can find that post here. :)
Let me give you a quick run down on how we did it. The goal had been for the pond to stretch along the fence, but we ran into an issue with an old sewer cover (at least that's what we think it is). That cover didn't allow us to dig down deep enough. So with went with coming out into the patio area. The back half and one side are about 2.5 feet deep, and the front corner is about 12 inches deep. This gives frog/toad eggs and little fishes a place to slip away from bigger fish.
We cut away all the roots really short, cleaned out all the rocks and added a layer of sand from our old sandbox to the bottom. The lad doesn't use the sandbox anymore so we figured we'd might as well make good use of that sand. The lad took a good amount of time making it as smooth as possible.
The stones around the top are from our old rose garden/small pond. We have a piece of wood in the new pond as already small finches have slide on the plastic in their attempt to get down to the water. We don't want birds drowning in it. Hopefully the wood will help. We may need to make a small island of some sort. We saw those at a pond place in London and that gave us ideas of our own to try to recreate.
My son has learned
1. A big project is made smaller if you just work at it for 30 minutes at a time.
2. Asking for help doesn't mean you aren't doing the job, just means you are asking for help with things you can't figure on your own.
3. Things work best sometimes with a team (mom, international student, lad and sometimes dad). We couldn't have gotten the liner in all by ourselves, it took a team.
4. Paying attention to detail matters when it comes to making an area smooth.
5. To use the right tool for the job. sometimes he needed a spade, other times a square edge shovel and sometimes a trowel was the best tool.
Anyways, that's T for Making Time.... our new pond. This post is part of a series from Marcy at Ben And Me. You can find that post here. :)
click image to go to source: Ben and Me
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