Lotus Pond
Spring 2001
(above) Here is the flower bed and puttin' green in the front yard (Summer 2000) before i tore the whole cotton pickin' thing up to install Lotus Pond. Shady Pond is toward the back of the picture, just above the center. All the flowers you see were taken up and put back in new flower beds around Lotus Pond.
(above) Rough layout of Lotus Pond. The flowering plants have all been lifted, and i'm starting to shape the new flower bed at the top edge of the hole. What looks like a spider web is not from the critters that live around here - strings have been installed to level the edges of the pond as it is shaped. Instructions for leveling pond: dig a hole, hammer in some stakes aroung the edges, pull string from stake to stake, use string level ($2 at Home Depot) to get the edges levelled.
(above) Liner going in, and starting to install brick edging between pond and new flower bed at bottom of picture. Top center shows concrete blocks to support spillway stone just below beginning of hole for veggie filter.
(above) 4" PVC in trench coming from Lotus Pond and into the edge of Shady Pond with "pipe boot" method. Whole thing gets buried after checking for leaks. Nice shot of Yellow Flag Iris growing in Shady Pond.
(above) Brick edging just about done, as well as preparing soil in new flower bed. Time to get to work on the Veggie Filter at top center. By the way, the water is not green with algae, it's just muddy.
(above) Wow, what a really, tremendously, enormously huge pile of dirt we see here. Believe me, this awesomely tremendous pile of dirt got about twice as big as the pile of dirt from diggin Shady Pond. For dirt pile afficianados, the Lotus Pond "addition" to this dirt pile is closer to the camera and is a little oranger in color - really a lot more dirt that there used to be in this pile of dirt. In fact, this pile of dirt is so large that you lose all perspective on how large it really and truly is so it really doesn't look as large as it actually is - very hugely large. Fortunately, i got it timed just right as neighbors were again on their annual trip to Vegas. When they got back, told them i felt really bad about all the grass dying last summer, and wanted to make it up to them by doing some more landscaping for them. Helpful Hint: This time use Fescue grass - costs just a little bit more, but takes longer to die in the summer.