Rock Garden

 When people generally talk about rock gardening, most seem to refer to using small spaces to look like rugged, mountainous landscapes. Requirements are a hillside, or building up a hillside.

Unfortunately, most of us don't have the luxury of large acreage where we can develop what one might call "the traditional rock garden".

Hey guys. Why let that stop you?!

Here's a picture of just one of my rock gardens. Rocks here are made into a feature and it adds interest to the surrounding plants.

This is in a part of the yard that gets lots of sunlight, so the plants I have there draw butterflies and they use the rocks to warm their bodies.

Toads also seem to hang around there, along with chipmunks, rabbits and frogs. And the birds love it, especially the robins. They find the worms to be rather plentiful.

As I write this, we have a large area where we tore down an above ground pool a couple years ago. It was notorious for collecting water. We had a continuous unwanted pond. We put in a dry creek and am making a large rock garden. This is a sandy area, as there was a lot of sand under the pool, so this all seemed natural.

Rock Gardens are high maintenance and weeds are generally a problem.

Plant a variety of species, repeating some species several times to make the Garden look natural. Ideally, rock Garden plants should spread slowly. Take care not to overplant.

Plants that are low growing and have a clumping habit are work best and look best in your rock garden. But it's your garden so experiment.

Dwarf evergreens and ferns give a very nice look to your rock garden.

Rocks native to your area will look natural and will be the cheapest and easiest to obtain. Large rocks with irregular shapes look interesting in the rock garden, but keep in mind that you'll need smaller rocks,

Rock gardening can be fun. It can definitely be a part of your landscape that catches people's eyes. The idea is to create your own masterpiece. It's so simple a caveman can do it.

Bio Balls & Waterfall Box Equals Crystal Clear Pond Water

 

I've had my large pond for maybe 15 years and my small pond for about 25 years. Until this year I have never had water so clear that you could easily see the bottom of the pond. I've tried chemicals and quilt batting around my filters. That helped some but was getting costly plus I had to clean my filters pretty much every 3 days. And the water still wasn't clear.

I did find a couple chemicals that worked pretty well, as far as at least making the pond clear enough to see the fish. 

I use Barley Extract about once a month. It definitely helps clear the water some. Many people put barley straw in the pond and as it slowly breaks down, it does help clarify the pond.

The problem is it takes a long time to brake down and I never cared for the straw bundles floating in the pond.  Just didn't look right.

Crystal Clear Barley Extract Concentrate - Natural Liquid Pond Clarifier - 64 Ounce of Barley Straw Extract Treats Up to 32,000 Gallons

But this year my grandson and I were out by the pond feeding the koi and he said it would be nice to add a waterfall. Sounded good to me so I ordered a waterfall box. 

The boxes were $150 - $250 locally but I went on Amazon and found this one.

Aquascape Pond Filter and Waterfall Spillway, Efficient Mechanical and Biological Filtration, Compact | 77020,Black

Then I made a decision that was epic. Well, looking back now, it might not have been epic but it definitely changed everything. I ordered Bio Balls. The box and balls came late in the day so we hooked up the box where our small stream was flowing and added the balls and decided to build the waterfall the next day. When we came out the next day we could see the bottom of the pond for the first time since we cleaned and reopened the pond.

Let me give you the companies description. "OUTSTANDING FILTRATION! Each bio ball is covered in spines to dramatically increase the surface area of each ball to nearly 2 square feet providing space for a massive number of beneficial bacteria to colonize. These good bacteria break down harmful organic waste."

So basically the filter pushes the water up thru the filter in the box which is shown above. The bio balls are in a net and they sit on top of the filter. The filter and the bio balls collect waste from the pond and clear water pours out.

Now as the water flows thru here, it then passes bacteria back into the pond. This is not only healthy for your fish but also helps clear the pond.

Aquatic Experts Bio Balls Filter Media - 1.5 Inch Large Bio Ball for Pond Filter - Perfect Bio Balls for Pond Filter Media – Made in The USA (300 Count Bio Balls with Mesh Bag)

At first I would clean the bag of balls out and the filter once a week. Overkill!. I now do it anywhere between once a month and once every six weeks.

I take a large bucket and get water from the pond and rinse the filter and the bio balls in it. This cleans the excess goop but keeps the bacteria. Put them back in the box and enjoy a clear pond.

I took out about 100 of the balls and added them in the box where the small stream runs. The waterfall box came with a small net bag so I put the balls in there. So now we have two areas where the water flows thru a filter and balls.

I can't believe I didn't do this years ago. This has been the best year to go out and actually see the fish and the crystal clear water.

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Add Color to Your Landscape by Thinking Outside the Box

 Sometimes you find yourself wondering how you can brighten up your landscape in different ways besides just flowers and flowering bushes.

Take a look in your backyard. What structures do you have? A gazebo? A shed. I have both and they needed painting. My shed was a barn red and the gazebo was the same old drab white you see everywhere.

I started thinking of ways to make them look better and make the gazebo a focus in the year. Well, since I have a couple ponds in the back and a dropped in pond on my deck, they are the focal point. But I wanted the gazebo to stand out. It was a gift to my wife from my dad. Both have passed away but I wanted the gazebo be kind of a remembrance to them.

Blue! I decided to go blue. Obviously. Then I painted the floor a dark green. It was totally a coincidence that an old zoo sign I picked up when working had colors that matched the gazebo. Even the red blended in.

Originally there was lattice around the bottom part as well as covering the top. But it was hard to blow leaves and dirt off through the lattice and there were clumps of stuff on the top. So I pulled the lattice.

Now I can easily take a leaf blower and clean all the debris off the floor..

Next was the shed. The red was not going to work. So I decided to use the color scheme of the gazebo and switch it. A green wall with blue trim. The nice thing is when the shadows are out back, sometimes you can't even see the shed as it blends into the background.

It's an old shed so I patched it up and then painted. Funny story. Now it is but not so much at the time. This is a water based paint. Weatherman said 0% chance of rain. He lied. I got 3 sides done and the rain came. Went back after it passed and pretty much repainted the sides. Then I painted the front and the rain came again. I look out my sliding glass door and watch the front of the shed turn red again.

Yeah. I was not a happy camper. I was ready to give up but went out in the evening and touched up the other 3 walls and completely redid the front. SMH. It didn't rain until the next evening.

Look out in your backyard. Can you do something similar?

How to Make Your Deck Unique

 How would you like to make your deck stand out from the others? I'm going to show you some ways to make your deck unique. 

In this picture you can see I've dropped a pond into the deck as well as a Japanese Maple. One thing I want to point out if you decide to do something like this. Make certain you build a support stand under the deck to hold whatever you drop down.

In this case it's very important. The pond holds 75 gallons of water. Building a platform not only holds it up but also removes this weight from the floor of the deck.

The same goes for the Japanese Maple. This is a big pot and with the dirt in it, it's heavy. I had wiggle room with the pond liner as it was empty when I dropped it in so I could take my time to manipulate the wood holding it up.

Not so with the Japanese Maple. Drop that down with the support too low and it could fall through the hole and ruin your tree. Also notice I didn't make the pot flush with the floor. I left the top width above the floor so that debris being blown around wouldn't all gather in the pot.

It's not quite dark outside but it's dark enough that the motion sensor light kicked on. I have a red bulb in it. It not only makes the deck look pretty cool but, surprisingly, it seems to keep the mosquitoes away from me when my skin is red from the light.

As you can see in this picture, a stickman is enjoying the ambiance.

Gorgeous 40 Year Old Japanese Maple

 This Japanese Maple is forty plus years old. My sister-in-law was here one year and tore out my old shrubs. I wasn't happy about it at the time and my wife knew it. But after tearing out the shrubs she planted a tiny Japanese Maple.

It didn't do a lot for some time, as this variety was slow growing, but eventually it became a centerpiece in our front yard. We both swore every year in the spring that it was dead but it would always come back. The last day I saw my wife alive I was pushing her in her wheelchair to the car to take her to the airport so she could visit her family in California. She told me it was definitely dead.

Unfortunately, she never saw it bloom that year. And it has kept on blooming and growing year after year. 

My neighbor has a yard that could definitely go on Better Homes and Gardens. She is shocked by the way it grows. She asked what I did to to it. Nothing. Seriously. I have never pruned it or fertilized it or anything. I pull the weeds around it and mulch every few years.

That's it.

My grandson and I just bought 2 different varieties for out back. One is by our largest pond and one I currently have growing in a pot by the deck pond. I have a picture in another post.

I do not know the variety of this plant. It kind of resembles the one below.

Deck Pond

 

Here's an update on my pond I installed into the deck. I've added a Japanese Maple behind it in a pot. The plans are to cut into the floor and drop the pot down so only the top two or three inches show so it will be easier to see the display around the tree.

The fish love this pond. We keep the new ones here the first year. They are all koi. I bring them in during the winter and take them out to our smaller front pond in the spring. They don't reach the large pond until they reach a size where our largemouth bass can't eat them.

I show you the basics of doing this in a previous post in case you want to do the same. It's worth the work. The pond sits on a platform I built under the deck so the deck doesn't support the weight. It just drops in and I bring it in for the winter and cover the hole so we don't fall in.

Fish Feeding Frenzy

 When I close my ponds out back for the winter (3 of them), I keep the large one open. They contain my large koi and a bass, some bluegill and a couple catfish. 

I close my deck pond and bring those fish inside for the winter, as well as the smaller fish in the small pond. Each year there is one or two that get transferred to the large pond as they are too big for our inside ponds.

Here's one of my indoor ponds housing these fish. I wanted to show you how they attack their food. My grandson hand feeds them as well.

I have a pump and a small aquarium water heater inside the pond. We keep the water around 76 degrees.

Unfortunately a couple days ago two of our fish jumped out and we found them on the floor. Too late to save them. So I put a screen covering on top. This is the first time it ever happened but be aware of that possibility if you do this.