It was 10:30 on a sultry southern Tuesday morning. The sort of morning where the air is so thick with humidity that it feels as if you could scoop it into bowls and serve it as a new kind of pudding. The atmosphere was heavy with the promise of a day that could only be deemed as "Africa Hot" and would make you feel like a wrung out dishrag before it was over.
As I stood waiting on the banks of the disaster that I call a pond, I heard the low rumble of a diesel engine in the distance. Instantly I knew that my pond savior had come to rescue me from overgrown banks, shallow weed filled water and a leaky dam. For a moment I waited, heart racing, afraid that is was only a nearby tractor when I saw him top the hill.
As I had hoped it was none other than pond constructor extraordinaire Ronnie Rathel and his strapping young blond assistant introduced to me as Manuel Labor (funny, he did not look spanish to me) but in this day and age, names can be deceiving. After nearly two months of planning and scheduling conflicts, they had finally come to breach my dam and begin stage one of the pond renovation.
So they began to dig as I stood by with bated breath, armed with a new dip net that hubby had Irish Engineered into a 7 foot long tool with the addition of copious amounts of duct tape and a 4 foot length of conduit so that I could catch any escaping fish.
And they dug...
And they dug some more...
It was nearing one o'clock when they decided to break for lunch. Not realizing that it would take several hours to finish the work I had failed to bring anything with me. Being the well bred southern gentlemen they are, they offered to share their lunch with me. We sat down to a meal of potted meat, vienna sausages, saltine crackers, hot sauce and ice cold Mountain Dew. Can't say I've ever had a better meal. It made me remember all the hot afternoons that I spent fishing with my dad on Lake Eufaula as a child. We definitely had some happy times there and they make me miss him all the more.
After our quick lunch Ronnie and Manuel returned to work. Funny thing. Notice the Levi Garrett chaw in his top pocket? He had a wad of that stuff in his mouth the whole time and for the first two hours I never saw him spit! From my limited knowledge of chewing tobacco, swallowing is not a good idea. After lunch I started watching him out of the corner of my eye. He would look to see if I was looking and would only spit if he thought I wouldn't see him! What a character he is and it was a much appreciated polite gesture.
The digging got comical at times. Apparently the backhoe he borrowed has controls that are exactly opposite in operation to those of his excavator. To add insult to injury, this particular machine was not equipped with a switch that would reverse the controls. What should have been a two hour job was turning into a four job but he continued to dig muttering expletives under his breath.
Finally about 3:00 pm he hit water and with a torrent the pond began to drain!
After two hours of draining the water level had dropped about a foot and no fish had escaped.
I checked it early this morning and the water level had dropped another foot but the torrent had turned into a trickle. Ronnie had gotten as deep as he could without upending the backhoe and my dam is too narrow to support his excavator. So, I called in a willing friend who hand dug out the channel another foot deep and the water began to flow at a more steady rate. Hopefully in a few days the pond level will be down to where we want it and the higher ground will be begin to dry out.
The story will continue in mid to late July once the ground is dry and we begin to dig with the really big machines.
