Jan Goldfield's Blog
Posted by Jan Goldfield
Recently the US and Western Europe have been experiencing weather extremes. England, Scotland, Wales, Sweden, have been blasted with punishing hurricane force winds.Majestic old trees have come down across cars, roads, houses, killing some, injuring others and leaving devastating damage behind. The entire middle part of the US has had severe winter weather with power outages lasting for days with many deaths attributed to the weather extremes. Often this weather can topple a tree into your pond or blow a sharp object into your liner.
It seems insignificant to talk about backyard garden ponds when people are suffering so much. But when the weather clears, property repairs have to be tended to. Most people love their ponds and want to know how to best take care of any damage. Often professionals are not readily available so any do it yourself advice is welcomed.
One of the things I talk about in my articles is do it yourself techniques. They cost less, are generally well within the scope of average folk, even old ones like me.
A leaking liner, unless it has to be replaced, is one of the most common problems facing a pond owner after a weather related disaster. And like other pond problems, it is sometimes simple to fix the problem without needing professional help. Read "Liner Leaks" for the most common causes and fixes.
Posted by Jan Goldfield
It's the dead of winter and many parts of the US are getting hammered by blizzards, sleet, ice and wind storms. Our ponds are suffering. Well, actually, our ponds are most likely just fine; it's our fish we worry about.
Gases must be exchanged for fish to breathe. The noxious gases must have a hole through which to leave and the good gases must get into to the water.
I always suggest leaving a hole open in the ice, either using a commercial deicer or a pot of warm water placed on the ice in the morning. You can also thaw the ice by hooking up your garden hose to an indoor tap and running the water over the ice. Hook it up to the cold water. I would suggest if you must run the hose for a long time, to screw on a dechlorinating device between the hose and the water tap unless you use well water.
HOW TO SPEAK POND
You are learning that if you are a pond hobbyist, there is an entire vocabulary that we pond people use. We describe specific things and use odd terms with which to do it. Because of that, I have put together a pond person's glossary. I hope it can be of some help.
Posted by Jan Goldfield
On 29 August, 2005, the Gulf Coast of the US was forever changed. New Orleans and the Mississippi Gulf Coast were battered by Hurricane Katrina. The Gulf Coast towns were obliterated. New Orleans was largely spared by the winds, but because of the poor designing and building of its levees, the city was flooded for 5 weeks. It has yet to recover and perhaps never will. I live north of Lake Pontchartrain where the storm surge filled our neighborhood with four feet of water. Over 20 pine trees, 80 or more feet tall landed on our house. All together we had 140+ trees removed from our lot. Of course, we had to have the house bulldozed as well.
At my age, I did not want to spend at least 2 years rebuilding a house, so we bought another one farther north and west. This doesn't mean we are any safer, but this house didn't flood, so we feel safer.
PTSD is still rampant all over the area. Only about 10% of the housing stock is habitable in New Orleans, crime is escalating daily and only about 1/2 the population has returned. I am not sure that New Orleans can ever regain its unique status in this country.
A couple of days ago, I was in my old neighborhood and decided to drive past the lot where my house once was. Neighbors bought it to build on, but building has not started yet. My garden suffered almost total destruction what with bulldozers, tree removal machines and trucks driving over it daily. But guess what? I had thousands of narcissus, daffodils and jonquils planted and right now they are in full bloom. Almost a half acre of white and yellow blooms. How could we not dance wtih them?
Posted by Jan Goldfield
If you have decided to make the leap into a do it yourself pond building project, here's the way I developed. I learned how to build slightly above ground after realizing that run off can get into the pond water and kill plants and fish. You will not find this method anywhere else and I am convinced it is the best and used it all the years I was in business.
By building the sides of the pond above the surrounding ground, you also keep the pond down in the ground where it belongs. That might not be a problem in Minnesota or Montana, but here in soggy New Orleans it is a huge problem. We are below sea level, as all of you now know after you saw Katrina inundate us. We have always known it. The water table is just barely below the surface, so when we dig, we often hit water.
When it rains, the water level rises and can push the pond water out of the pond. The water level goes back down and you are convinced your pond has sprung a leak. With the extra weight of the above ground water, the pond liner and therefore, the water stays where it belongs. Build your own pond. Have a good time and think of the bragging rights.
Posted by Jan Goldfield
Before I was a pond builder, I was a gardener. As all of you gardeners know, a garden is never finished. I have heard that a garden takes 15 years to be complete after the original planting. If that is the case, it is true that our gardens are never complete.
We are always adding plants, rearranging plants, putting benches in or garden totems. As I was sitting in my garden many years ago, I thought that a waterfall would be great in the teardrop shape that my two walkways formed. Now that I had the idea, how was I going to build a pond there. With that realization came all the questions that I needed to answer before I could build a pond.
At that time, in 1987, there were no pond books or places to look at ponds. Oh, there were a few rectangular or round concrete ponds with fountains in parks or zoos, but nothing that a 48 year old woman could tackle and feel confident about doing.
I started to look around for materials, didn't find much and started experimenting. After months and months of failures, I had a working waterfall. Then I had to learn that under the pecan tree was not a good place to put the pond. As I started my pond building business, I learned so many other things. I am trying with these articles to share some of those things with you.