filter, cleaning and planting help please - long
 

Well the pond is finally clear...YIPPPEEE.....this however has led to a new
question. As I can now see the bottom of the pond instead of just feel it
with my feet while planting and rearranging I am seeing that there are areas
in the middle around pota and structures that seem to have an inch or two of
sludge? How do I clean this or should I leave it? My SO wants to leave it
as we would like to see if the frogs can be wintered ove as opposed to being
dead bodies every spring, but I am sure there is other stuff we should do to
provide winter areas for the frogs. Winters here get down to -30c with
2-3'of snow on average, pond is 15'x21' with sloping walls on 3 sides and
straight drop on the other. It is lined with EPDM and has a 12" garden
border around it, I would post pictures if I could figure out how. I also
need help with planting marginals as there are only a few crevices between
rocks and I have a few plants that need only 2-6" of water cover and the
side slope far too much to allow planting on them...is there a way of
tethering baskets or the plants themselves(I find the baskets to be annoying
visually). Also how often should I transplant as there is a basket of iris
here with roots that flow about 3 feet out of the basket which looks wrong
to me but then again I am a gardener not a ponder (until now)

Finally does anyone have any idea for dividres we can use between the layers
of filter material? We are using what I call lighting grid, but it is very
brittle and tends to break at the least provication. I would like to find
something with more flexability in an approximate 12x15 size.


Sorry for the long winded message and thanks in advance for your help.

Elaine

I've seen this planting 'sacks' available, they are very flexible, weed barrier
type fabric.
You could try and jury rig something like that.
People have used anklet or knee sock nylons to plant impatiens in waterfalls.
Think along those lines and maybe you can come up with something, burlap sacks
maybe?


kathy :-)
algae primer
http://hometown.aol.com/ka30p/myhomepage/garden.html

I've seen this planting 'sacks' available, they are very flexible, weed barrier
type fabric.
You could try and jury rig something like that.
People have used anklet or knee sock nylons to plant impatiens in waterfalls.
Think along those lines and maybe you can come up with something, burlap sacks
maybe?


kathy :-)
algae primer
http://hometown.aol.com/ka30p/myhomepage/garden.html

On Tue, 24 Aug 2004 11:49:23 -0400, "elaine" wrote:

Well the pond is finally clear...areas around pots have an inch or two of
sludge? How do I clean this or should I leave it?

If you have a wet dry vac, try that, in the wet mode, removing the pleated
filter. I have one with 12 gallon canister capacity works great.

planting marginals 2-6" of water cover

As K30 mentioned, or the not aggressive varieties could be tried bare root.
I'm thinking arrowheads, or you might try ground covers that like wet feet.
Creeping Jenny, Creeping Primrose... ~ jan


~Power to the Porg, Flow On!~

On Tue, 24 Aug 2004 11:49:23 -0400, "elaine" wrote:

Well the pond is finally clear...areas around pots have an inch or two of
sludge? How do I clean this or should I leave it?

If you have a wet dry vac, try that, in the wet mode, removing the pleated
filter. I have one with 12 gallon canister capacity works great.

planting marginals 2-6" of water cover

As K30 mentioned, or the not aggressive varieties could be tried bare root.
I'm thinking arrowheads, or you might try ground covers that like wet feet.
Creeping Jenny, Creeping Primrose... ~ jan


~Power to the Porg, Flow On!~

"~ jan JJsPond.us" wrote in message
...
On Tue, 24 Aug 2004 11:49:23 -0400, "elaine"
wrote:

Well the pond is finally clear...areas around pots have an inch or two of
sludge? How do I clean this or should I leave it?

If you have a wet dry vac, try that, in the wet mode, removing the pleated
filter. I have one with 12 gallon canister capacity works great.

All I have to figure out is how to get the sludge and not the rest of the
water......also have to buy extensions so that it reaches the bottom of the
pond

will think on this and perhaps a way to "filter" the water I take out so
that the excess can be returned to the pond as I am on a dug well and with
having had little rain lately have no water to refill it with, and it is
already down 2" before cleaning.

"~ jan JJsPond.us" wrote in message
...
On Tue, 24 Aug 2004 11:49:23 -0400, "elaine"
wrote:

Well the pond is finally clear...areas around pots have an inch or two of
sludge? How do I clean this or should I leave it?

If you have a wet dry vac, try that, in the wet mode, removing the pleated
filter. I have one with 12 gallon canister capacity works great.

All I have to figure out is how to get the sludge and not the rest of the
water......also have to buy extensions so that it reaches the bottom of the
pond

will think on this and perhaps a way to "filter" the water I take out so
that the excess can be returned to the pond as I am on a dug well and with
having had little rain lately have no water to refill it with, and it is
already down 2" before cleaning.

If you have a wet dry vac, try that, in the wet mode, removing the pleated
filter. I have one with 12 gallon canister capacity works great.

All I have to figure out is how to get the sludge and not the rest of the
water......also have to buy extensions so that it reaches the bottom of the
pond

Try it once, you'll be surprised how much sludge 10-12 gallons will take
out... and you won't want to return the water, trust me. Full of sulphuric
acid. ~ jan


~Power to the Porg, Flow On!~

Try it once, you'll be surprised how much sludge 10-12 gallons will take
out... and you won't want to return the water, trust me. Full of sulphuric
acid. ~ jan

Correction hydrogen sulphide (or is that the same as sulphuric acid)?
~ jan


~Power to the Porg, Flow On!~