Life Aqautic on the Homestead (part 2)

Our Littlest Friend dips his toes in the cool water of one of my ponds.

Last week I wrote about why I love my ponds. This week I thought I would give a few pointers for "pond" building. Of course, in the Homestead context I am also including garden barrels and animal troughs as ponds.
I don't think the Internet needs another tutorial about building a basic pond so I will just focus on the helpful features and techniques I have learned through the experience of building several ponds.

This is one of my latest and favorite ponds that I have built. It is 5 feet long 3 feet wide and 3 feet deep. I didn't add any critters, not even snails. I just let nature takes its course and now it is a thriving and balanced ecosystem. In fact, as you can see, the plants need thinning, they are growing so well.

I did not introduce any animals to this pond. Only plants and water. A couple years later it is swimming with Rough Skinned Newts, Chorus frogs, skipper bugs, oar beetles and snails. Where do they come from? I have seen a newt walk up the driveway one rainy spring day. I have seen beetles fall from the sky into the water. Since I have often seen slugs and snails tangled in my dogs fur I don't doubt some of these creatures hitch hike their way into the pond. Regardless of how they get there, I am always happy and amazed to see them.

This spring, I spied a Columbia Spotted Frog  hangin’ out in it. If you look carefully you can also see a Rough Skinned Newt peeking up in the middle.The plants you see are goldfish grass, duckweed and a hardy Water Lilly.

You can also see the Butyl liner I used. It is very thick like a car tire inner-tube. It is non toxic and thick enough to last through dog, cat and raccoon toenails. I had it concealed more effectively in the past but all the many visitors to the edge of this pond have degraded my rock ledge. Keep that in mind when you build your own pond. Make the edges very stable because the allure of a pond is irresistible and you DO NOT want to take the pond out to make repairs once wildlife moves in.

Which bring me to a necessary caution. Please don't forget that with a pond comes a responsibility to supervise children and pets.
Even if you don’t have small children, you might have a visitor someday who does. Every visiting child is delighted to see a pond. It is a very magical place for them.

When our Littlest Friend comes to visit we inevitably spend a half hour or so watching the newts and frogs and if there is no wildlife to be seen, off come the shoes for a little toe dip.

Our dogs and visiting dogs alike, love to drink the water from the pond. You can tell it is a special treat for them. We have also had visiting dogs run straight into the pond. They thought the Lilly pads were solid ground! They have a very funny look on their faces when they sink. Some go in for a second time because it was apparently so fun. Or they're slow learners.

Because our ponds are such a popular place for kids and animals I put an added precaution.  I always build an easy exit from my ponds. I include a shallow end and ledges that build up to that shallow end, like steps, so that animals and people can easily escape the water should they fall in.

Even if you live in the city you will have varmint problems. Blue Herons, Kingfishers and Raccoons are very happy to fish out their dinners from your pond. We have a blue Heron that will sit on the crest of the roof and watch for fish in our biggest pond. The only fish that are left in this 14 year old pond are huge black goldfish. We can't even see them unless the sun shines just so.

Raccoons love to come at night and fish out all the snails to eat for dinner. You will see goldfish grass draped all over the edges of your pond when you get up in the morning.

To give pond life a place to escape to I try to include a deep spot at least 2 1/2 feet deep, so that pond creatures can hide down there, out of reach. It helps quite a bit. I have also added black "Milk Crates".

I get them from the storage section of our department store. They don't show from above the pond and they make it even harder for the Herons and Raccoons to chase down and catch the amphibians and fish. They also make the pond a little safer for animals that fall in since they can be stood on. The crates can make a great place to set plant pots too.

At the Homestead we have a lot of water troughs and half barrels, for the horses, chickens or providing water for the Honey bees. I have been converting each of these into little ecosystem ponds. I only use Goldfish grass and duckweed for troughs since they are nontoxic and harmless to my goofy horses who like to eat them.

This is the root system, but Goldfish Grass will grow new roots if you just have a snip of the plant.

I put the roots and ends of pieces without roots in an old recycled container of any sort.

Then a little clay or goo from another pond or even loose dirt from a gopher hole (don't use garden dirt, it has too much nitrogen in it) and then pile rocks on top to hold them down. Silt and organic sediment will form as the pond ages and the plants will grow roots into it.

The goldfish grass will grow to the top and lay across the surface sending a few roots into the water and blooming tiny white blooms. It looks a little messy when you walk up and look at the trough (the leaves that touch air will turn brown) but, if you stick your hand in the shaded water underneath the plants you will feel that the water is 10 degrees cooler. The animals- dogs, horses, cats, birds- all go straight for the pond water, choosing it over any other source. It must taste yummy and very refreshing on a hot day.

 

For years I had to drain the mosquito larvae infested water and scrub the red algae out of my troughs and water barrels a couple times a summer, which was a real pain. I set up my first trough as an ecosystem about eight years ago. It has been a great discovery for me. It’s made a big improvement in water quality for all. Instead of having hot stale water with red algae in it to drink, the animals now have cool, fresh, oxygenated water.

When the duckweed gets this thick I just skim handfuls off and toss it in the garden for mulch. You want only 30 to 50 percent of the surface covered. This keeps the water cool but lets the goldfish grass underneath get some sun also.

Rio has to have his goldfish grass replaced now and then because he can’t just be a normal horse. He likes to put his head under water like a Hippo and eat the grass on hot days. What a nut.

 Here are just a few of the resources I found on line for designing and building ponds. Don't get too caught up in all the talk about pumps and filters and water falls, you can have them if you want, but you don't need them. Just start small and go from there. Most of all, have fun!
http://deepgreenpermaculture.com/diy-instructions/building-a-small-water-garden/
 http://www.lochnesswatergardens.com/pondblog/clearing-your-ponds-green-water/
http://www.butylproducts.co.uk/Products-Services/Ponds-Lakes/LiningMaterials/
http://www.wildewaters.co.uk/pondlineradvicesheet.htm

Life Aquatic on the Homestead (Part 1)

Making a lot of noise for little frogs, I went out one night to see what all the ruckus was about- Ahem.

Years ago I learned how to build  a pond to be self sustaining (no pumps, filters or chemicals) from a truly lovely lady who called herself “The Pond Lady”. We have since, sadly, lost her to breast cancer, but she did a great deed in the world with her enthusiastic educational efforts. And those whom she taught have been teaching formally and informally with the same enthusiasm.

I have found that once you build a truly balanced pond and see the amazing transformation that happens to your micro climate, you will want to build more and more of them. Then, when you run out of room for ponds in your own space (if you have too many ponds in your yard they join together and form a mote around your house), you will be very excited to encourage your friends and cohorts to build a pond or two.

We have a few of these food grade blue barrel halves around the Homestead. My mom had a friend who worked at a bakery and he gave these to her. I don't particularly like plastic but they are already here and I am not going to toss them into someone else's backyard (the landfill) just because I don't like plastic. I have decided to just use them while they hold water.

I love looking into each "pond" I've created and seeing all the life I made room for.
It took me all last summer to get this series of photos of our little frog friends in our garden water barrel at the Homestead.

Egg sack

Just about to "hatch", they are already wiggling!

Just hatched

Livin' the life with his belly full of bugs and algae

Look Ma! I have LEGS!

The very first thing The Pond Lady taught us was to stop thinking of our ponds as swimming pools and start thinking of them as ecosystems.

There are ways to have lovely clean water that has no chemicals in it and no pumps for tadpoles to get stuck in. There are methods to keep the mosquito and algae population down and healthy wildlife up.

My method mostly depends on digging the hole, lining it with something the Racoons can't poke a hole in with their sharp claws and filling it with water. Then putting pots of “goldfish grass” Egeria densa at the bottom and having at least one type of floating or partial surface covering plant (about 30% to 50%) to keep the water slightly shaded and cool. Voila! The frogs, newts and skipper bugs will appear as if they had been waiting by your front gate for this moment!

Egeria densa can be invasive also, so be careful not to introduce it to native water ways. But it is fantastic for water oxygenation in your ponds, water bowls and troughs. And because of this, it is the cornerstone of your pond ecosystem. It uses up nitrogen (that is introduced by fish poop, hay, leaves, and bugs that fall in) preventing algae from forming (algae will have no nitrogen to eat) and then it uses its green leaves to turn sunlight and nitrogen into oxygen through photosynthesis. If you sit and watch on a sunny day, you can actually see hundreds of tiny oxygen bubbles forming on the leaves and then floating to the top, keeping the water oxygen content high.

This water bug literally fell from the sky into the water as I was filling Rio's trough the other day. Who knew they could fly?

The nearest waterway to the very first pond that we ever built, was over a half mile away and down a sheer basalt cliff. That did not stop all the varied amphibians and water bugs from appearing as if by magic, in our new backyard pond.
Sure, we put some goldfish in there too. It was our first pond and we had small children who wanted fish in there. Two years later we had to drain it, net out and find homes for the HUNDREDS of little baby goldfish. It was one healthy habitat.

Although Gambusia affinis,  mosquito eating fish from the Guppy family, are very popular in some states, I no longer use them in my ponds, but I do have one pond and another trough with Gambusia already in them.

One reason I don’t use them anymore; I have serious doubts that these fish cannot survive Oregon winters in the wild ( as I have been assured by the Vector Control officer of our County.) They have survived just fine in my small, frozen over ponds, and since I cannot imagine our Willamette River getting any colder than that, I believe they could be a future invasive species here in Oregon, as they are now in other states and countries.

They do eat mosquito larvae, but they also eat everything else. Which includes native frog and toad eggs along with dragonfly and damselfly larvae, newt eggs and polliwogs and so on. I don’t feel they serve a big enough purpose to justify the damage they do. They also procreate at an alarming rate and soon they are the only living things in the pond.

I would suggest that you give your pond a full year before using these fish. You will be pleasantly surprised at how many natives will move in to take care of the mosquito problem. It just takes them time to reach a balance. I would even choose mosquito “dunks” over Gambusia. At least one can stop using them when the pond gets balanced with other wildlife. Once you install Gambusia in your pond, you will always have them. It’s impossible to remove them all, no matter how hard you try. So think long and hard about whether you want to use them or not.

I no longer put goldfish or Koi in my ponds either. They are not as veracious as Gambusia, but they do make it difficult for the native amphibians to procreate. They are beautiful to gaze upon, but they fill the water with lots of fish poop and left over food, all nitrogen rich and algae inducing. Koi will root around in your plant pots and the silt at the bottom, making your pond murky which then makes it necessary to put in a pump and filter.

Next week: Part 2 , where I show how to put in plants and how my goofy horse gets them out.

What We've Been Up TO

Sorry for the lag in posts this summer. We have all been so busy it's been difficult to even gather our thoughts let alone write them down!

I have been working on a post about ponds but it has taken on a life of it's own.

In the meantime I have been collecting photos along the way so I decided to just give you a pictorial overview of some of our activities this summer and catch up on the writing when I get a chance.

Thanks for stopping by and we'll talk soon.

One of my top bar hives had a mouse.

 The Meat Chicks are well on their way.

Our daughter in law had a show.

Buck plays host at the Art Shack

The old barn is getting a face lift, 2 inches a month.

And the underside is full of Carpenter Ants.

It's Red Haven peach season at our neighbors.

 

 Buck fermented amazing pickles from the cucumbers he grew.

 Our littlest friend has coming for visits. Busy, busy.

My and Jake's coffee roasting has been taking on a much more serious flavor. We have been cupping wholesale lots of green coffee beans to prepare for large orders.

 Amazing sunsets are pretty regular this summer. All the smoke in the air.

Wild life has been staring in the window at us.

 I found some really promising fasteners at Harbor Freight.

 Buck is really good at keeping us fed.

A blessed moment for June, that puppy finally slept!

Congratulationgraduation!

June graduated this Spring with a double major in Psychology and Russian. Which kind of sounds like she went to school to become a Cold War spy. I tease her about this.

What she is really interested in is Behavior. The Russian was something she just did for fun, I guess. Everyone's idea of fun is different.

This girl has been working hard at school and abroad for several years and even lived in Russia for a full year last year. It was a wonderful experience but I think it was also a little hard to take when the sun was only visible for 45 minutes a day.

She has also been Teachers Assistant all this year for a class on Behavior Modification, where the students pick something they would like to change about themselves and then proceed to make a plan and execute it. She had a lot of fun watching and helping students use themselves as a tool for learning a complex subject. She is a wonderful teacher and we are very proud of her!

She has big plans for the near future but she will be home and flexible for the next 9 months.

So what do you get a girl like this for a graduation present?
A puppy of course!

Our new Grandpup Max, 4 pounds 2 ounces at 7 weeks.

One tool she has for dealing with stress and homesickness has been daily fixes of "Cute Overload", "I Can Has Cheezburger" and the Oregon Humane Society adoption web page. She has been planning and dreaming of a puppy for 3 years now. We decided that the opportunity to get a puppy and have the summer to train it was perfect timing for her and she agreed.

She looked for a couple weeks at the Oregon Humane society for just the right guy. She had been thinking about it for so long that she knew Max was the right one the minute she held him. He will be around 20 pounds when he is grown, but he looks like a Micro Rottweiler. He was 7 weeks old when she adopted him and weighed 4 pounds. She already has him trained to sit quietly in his kennel, "beg" by putting his head down, which she will turn into a non-begging behavior, and he is very nearly house trained, all at 9 weeks! Sorry, I have to brag a little...

I volunteered to "babysit" Max last weekend and I had a lot of fun watching Max experience the Homestead for the first time.

He is wearing a harness and a leash in this video because he was harder to keep ahold of than a live fish. I had to have something on him for his own safety. There are a lot of dangerous things on a farm. He is a real go-getter and I think she is going to have her hands full, but I know she is up to the task since she is the best dog trainer I have ever seen in my lifetime of showing and training dogs.

I Like Spiders and Snakes

I was a slightly strange little girl. As soon as school let out for the summer I would begin to collect every kind of insect on the farm and I would make bug zoos with my mom's canning jars. Then I would sadly watch them all die off. Since I had no idea what these insects ate or did for a living, I couldn't really care for them properly.

Spiders were the exception. A few juicy flies would keep them happy, so through the simple result of attrition I kept several spiders as "pets". To this day I will not kill a spider. I think they are really cool and they get rid of flies in the house. I do make them build new webs when they get too dusty and full of fly skeletons.

Another childhood fascination was with snakes. In Oregon there are very few dangerous creatures. We only have one poisonous snake, the Western rattlesnake, and it doesn't live in the Willamette Valley.
So I was free to wander the fields looking for Garter snakes. I would sneak up, grab them behind the head, wave them at my playmates and watch them scream and run!

Somewhere there is a photo of me at age 8, swinging two large snakes, one in each hand, while my cousins and neighbors run screaming. I think my mom took the photo just before she ran back to the house and locked the kitchen door. Ah, the heady power of wielding snakes!

I was excited when I lifted a messy roll of weed cloth last year and found a very large Northwestern Garter snake warming itself in the solar heat of the black cloth.

In the next fold was a very large Western Fence Lizard. Strange bed mates.

Then, when I picked up the rest of the roll, I found this stash of MY STRAWBERRIES!

I have been trying to get a crop of strawberries for the last three years. Between the voles, Robins and the Chipmunks I am losing ground.

I tried putting bird netting over the strawberry bed, but I kept finding little lizards tangled and trapped in it.

Hmm. How can I discourage this large group of strawberry thieves?

Bring in the snakes!
Of course it is too much to ask for a real snake to guard my berries 24/7 but this rubber snake is more than happy to do the job.
And it seems to be working. I have had many more strawberries this year and it is not because the plants are bigger. In fact they are a little stunted because I had to move them last fall.

 

The only downside to this method is that I keep scaring the *&#% out of myself when the weeds cover the snake and I forget it is there. I like snakes, but I don't like them sneaking up on me.

How Bee Proof is Bee Proof? The Strengths and Limitations of a Good Bee Suit

Being Spring, we have had a lot of interest in my post on the Ultra Breeze Bee Suit.
I have been pondering what I would say in a review of the suit for 3 or 4 weeks, and I have changed my mind several times on what exactly I have to say about the suit.

Not because the suit is any less than I expected, it is a fantastic piece of workmanship.
I love everything about the suit. It is easy to put on and take off. It has very good visibility, front and side. It really is very cool to wear, much cooler than the old suit I used to wear. It is especially cool if you are moving around, it really does breath.

Large, easily accessible pockets let me carry my "Epi-Pen" where I can get to it fast.

It has large well placed pockets. It has tight, heavy duty zippers and hook and loop tape to prevent gaps at the closures. It is a fantastic suit, clearly designed by a bee keeper who knew what he needed and sewn by people who care about quality. This suit will last a lifetime.

Hopefully mine will be long.


But, and this is a big "but", because I cannot really put it to the sting test, I cannot say it is sting proof.
Being allergic to bees, I am not the person to be testing it for sting-ability. I wear it as a last defense against the 1% chance of being stung. I am not in there throwing around hive frames full of bees, I am gently coercing my bee friends to let me peek inside or change syrup jars on the feeder. I am mowing wide swaths of grass and brush where there might be a hornet.

That's me pointing importantly while wearing my Ultra Breeze bee suit. That's Buck catching a swarm from a neighbors valve box.

Any major interactions with bees- catching swarms, moving hives, is being done by my Bee Deputes, Buck and Jake.

And this is where my story turns a little more philosophical.

Although these precautions had lulled me into a sense of safety, I had a little wake up call last weekend. I was lifting a cardboard box in my studio and, against all odds, I pressed my bare arm against a Yellow Jacket that was crawling on the box and was stung.

There were no doors or windows open. There was such a tiny chance that a bee would be in the room at all. How infinitesimal are the odds that that bee would be crawling on the back of a box right where my arm would press? Anyone want to do that math?

Among the many things I pondered that night while in the ER, was the fact that I can never be "Bee Proof".  I cannot avoid bees even when I am in my own home. I cannot be bee proof.
I cannot wear my bee suit at all times. There is no reason to live being afraid of what might happen, because I can never really know what is going to happen.

I also decided that my final word on the Ultra Breeze Bee Suit is this: buy the suit if you are just wanting to reduce the amount of stings you get and you want to have a cooler, better fitting and more comfortable suit that is made in the USA by people who care. It is well worth the money. It is the Maserati of bee suits.

But don't fool yourself if you are allergic to bees. A nice bee suit is not going to be the panacea you are hoping for. Bees are everywhere and weird things happen.