Kurt wrote:

In article ,
Angela Lamb wrote:

... but I do have lots of plants including oxygenators. They didn't
cost me anything like £100 though - I bought half a dozen bunches and
planted them 7 years ago.

That's the point I was making about buying (or just transplanting) native
oxygenators. If the plants grow wild in your area, then they'll overwinter
and eventually fill your pond.

I must have been very lucky because I don't do
any of the clever chemical juggling people in here do - I just leave it
all to take care of itself apart from the weeding every year.

As soon as you find the "sweet spot" for your eco system: the right
balance of plants, water, critters, etc., the need to artificially
adjust things will disappear. I think too many ponders try to
over-engineer their ponds (I have beeen guilty of that).
Nature does things really well, and we need to do is pay attention.

Yeah, we've probably all been guilty of that, but you're mostly right. I
would point out that the natural order of things is for ponds to become
bogs and for bogs to dry out - we try to stop things short of that
point :-)

So, in a sense, we never do want a "natural" pond, but we can come pretty
close.
--
derek
- Unless otherwise noted, I speak for myself, not rec.ponds.moderated
moderators.