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During last year's end of April holiday, we hired a mini digger to build a pond and dug a rough hole.
We weren't expecting the next step to take over a year to get around to! Having decided that our rough hole in the ground wouldn't really cut it, we bit the bullet and hired 2 men who knew what they were doing with a digger, and who turned the rough hole into this:
They added a shelf along one side and a shallow area at one end which will become a bog garden. We covered the excavation with a layer of sand:
We created a wall to separate the pond from the bog garden:
My parents came over for a pond-lining party:
During the course of last Sunday we got the underlay and liner in place and began to fill the pond.
The bog garden got a filling with water to flatten the liner. This will be pumped out when we create the bog:
The other half and I still have to conclude our argument about where to build up a rockery for a waterfall that will go around/down the middle of/next to the bog garden and I think we need to increase the height of the wall and shore up a low point in the banking, but it's already been idyllic to sit on the edge of the pond in the sunshine, dangling our feet in the water and watching the sky reflected in the water's ripples, and the water reflected on the branches of the willows at the edge of the pond.
It's now payday and my fingers are itching to get out my bank card and splurge on plants! I can't wait to see it planted up and see what moves in!
A closed mouth gathers no foot.
You call them cobbles, I call them pebbles, whatever they are still such heavy work and you have done a stirling job of laying them down, I hope you have a good holiday booked somewhere, or is it a hide at the bottom of garden to watch all the fantastic wildlife you will get when you finish this huge project.
Lot to learn
Definitely cobbles! The smaller pebbles (a few cm in size) are yet to come. There's a ton bag of them sitting on the driveway *sigh*. I have no holidays booked except for the Christmas period off work, which should be relaxing if I can get a few nice days in to finish this.
Ooooh, my muscles are aching in sympathy! That's a fabulous way to make the beach, so that there's places underneath for frogs to hibernate, perhaps.
I hope you get the weather over Christmas - you're doing such a great job and I can't wait to see the finished article!
Our herring gulls are red listed birds. Think about that the next time you hear some flaming idiot calling for a cull of them.
Rose Marsh, I hadn't thought of amphibians hibernating under the beach, but I reckon it would be ideal for them!
I wimped out and went Christmas shopping today. I did barrow 2 loads of clay round to the pond and do a bit of paddle stone edging, but I really need to do the edge shaping and with the ground so waterlogged it's impossible :( I'm hoping for some drier days this week so I can do a bit in my lunch breaks.
Progress at last! The ground has dried out a little (as in no visible standing water!) and the soil piles have thawed, so I could finally get a wheelbarrow through again. I was even coatless out there this lunchtime and managed to fill and edge one half of the bog garden. I'd've loved to get the other half done, but sadly I had to get back to my desk :(
Looking good, Maisie. I'm full of admiration for all the effort you've put in.
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Tony
My Flickr Photostream
Well done Maisie. I'm sure you will be well rewarded for all this hard work.
Cheers, Linda.
See my photos on Flickr
Fantastic progress Maise, you sure have worked very hard but the whole project is looking great.
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Regards, Hazel
Yay! Side 2 done!
Off to collapse in a heap now!