My husband and I just purchased 20 acres with an approx. 1 1/2 acre spring fed pond. We were told the pond had a "leak", which being novices did not alarm us. Well, after reading this forum I think we are in serious trouble. Our dam is completely overgrown with both large and small trees. The backside is no longer symmetrical in appearance and there is an area that definitely looks as though a minor landslide has occurred. Just below that area is a large DEAD pine that must be part of the problem. Immediately below this dead tree there is standing water that is running off.

The dam is on the east side of the pond and extends around the northern and southern corners. The western shore is a natural depression. The water level is 15 - 20 feet from the shoreline. After heavy rains two weeks ago it rose about 2 feet but since has returned to the previous level.

I am about to post pictures. Anywhere you see tall sawgrass is where water should be!

It will be extremely difficult/expensive to repair as the backside of the dam is heavily wooded and it would require clearing the land just to get equipment into the area. Also the backside of the dam is nearly a vertical drop off, so doing work by hand would be dangerous.

I'm open to any and all suggestions.

Here is a link to the photos. My Pond Album

Please excuse the litter in the photos. The land and pond had been neglected for some time prior to us purchasing it two weeks ago.

Hey Anna,
I just looked at your photos. I have several questions.
What role did the pond play in your decision to purchase the land?
Why did you buy the land?
And, do you intend to keep the property for a long time, or is it a short-term investment for you?
These answers will determine the advice I give.

Hi Bob,

We purchased the land to build our home upon. We plan to keep the property as long as we live. The pond played a major role in our decision to purchase. We own several large dogs and we also rescue and rehome dogs. Most of the dogs we own/foster have orthopedic difficulties and swimming is the absolute best exercise for restoring/maintaining muscle mass. We were also looking forward to having a backyard swimming/fishing hole and something picturesque to look at from our future deck.

Thanks!

Hi Anna, Welcome to Pond Boss:
Don't feel bad, I bought a catastrophe too, and now it has become my mission to fix it, a worthwhile cause. Different than your CATastrophe, but still a problem. You at least have the power (and now the avenue) to fix it. Good luck and stay involved here with the Pond Boss Family!

Hi Catmom!

Thanks for the warm welcome. This pond has me obsessed and worried. I'm even dreaming about ponds! A couple of weeks ago we got more rainfall (13") in three days than we usually get in a month and the dam did hold, so maybe it is not as bad as I think. It also has overflow pipes at each end but they seem low when compared to where the water level should be.

The pictures were taken a day after the rains. The other problem is the pesky dollar bonnet. You can't see them in the pictures because they were under water at the time but at least 60% of the surface is covered in it and then there is the grass. I've been reading up on both and it seems like I will have to poison the dollar bonnet and get some grass carp to take care of the grass once we get the dam and leak fixed. There is also a lot of debris and limbs in the pond that will have to be dredged up.

I'm afraid fixing this pond is going to cost more than my house! As soon as we get a boat out to the property I will take depth readings. The former owner said it was 30' deep in the center and with the height of the dam this might be accurate.

Thanks for the words of comfort. I'm waiting on Bob's reply with baited breath...

Anna

Well you're in good company here. I think that quote describes just about everybody here.

Anna, Anna, Anna:
Welcome to the dream world. Girlfriend Lake Chair and I have dreams on a regular basis about this lake, Muddy Green Waterfalls with cats floating on air mattresses, talking whales at pools in airports, Weed (the kind you smoke) growing all over the lake, she even had a dream that I walked on water-------welcome to our world!

Anna,welcome to the forum.You are now the proud owner of a pond.An obsession that will grow and grow until it consumes your entire being.When this finally occurs,you can become committed to the PondBoss funnyfarm.But dont worry,we keep it pretty clean,and theres always LOTS of company around.

Hi Anna,

Besides being told the dam leaks, have you observed any leakage?

Just because the dam is in disrepair doesn't mean it's leaking... yet! If it isn't leaking, you have little to worry about. A little work removing trees and backfilling collapsed areas should fix it right up. If it DOES show signs of leaking, it can be tough to fix, but not necessarily a disaster. I'll defer to the experts on that.

Best of luck,,,

Hey Anna,
Welcome...glad ya made it.
Your thread title makes me chuckle...
I think I bought a catastrophe
Some of us did it a little differently...
I think I created a catastrophe
Call it what you will. Ultimately, it winds up just being a regular old pond.

Welcome, Anna! If indeed, there is a 30 ft area near the dam, it sounds like you will have plenty of water for your intendede activities. I am also waiting to here from the head pondmeister.

Welcome Anna. As you can tell we can kind of obsessed with this stuff. Yeah lots of us dream about this and pray for more or less rain.

Wait until Lusk comes back. He always has the answers. He is THE Pond Boss. BTW, I'm whatever my Wife lets me be.

Too funny. Ironically there is an old mobile home on the property that some kids spray painted peace signs and the words "Love Shack" on the sides. Hubby found a set of bright green mardi gras beads with huge plastic green marijuana leaves in the bushes. Seems like there is a psychic connection already. LOL!





I was planning on adding a garden and some livestock later. Seems I am on my way to creating my own funny farm and this pond is going to send me over the edge. Nice to know I will have good company. Thanks!



Yes it is defintely leaking. The level rises with rain and always returns to the exact same level within a day or so. There is water on the backside of the dam too. By the lay of the land you can tell that the pond should be much larger.



I'm sure that with this new farming/ponding excursion I will create many disasters and learn lots of lessons. Glad I've got a great group of folks to share my follies with!

Thanks everyone for the extremely warm welcome! I've stopped drinking heavily and have put away the guns and dynamite for now. Can't wait to see what Bob comes up with.

Anna,

A belated welcome. Love your posts.

First, we love lessons -- especially with pictures.

Second, dynamite could be the answer, it is just a little difficult to purchase the stuff these days.

I'm sure Bob Lusk, or possibly Mike Otto, will have something quite insightful.

In the meantime, it sounds like all the hard work, and expensive work, has been done to your pond. Yes, you probably need to have your dam repaired. But, if it held water for many years, I'd suspect that it just needs some loving care. I'm not sure money will be the leading factor. You probably will have to drain the pond and let it dry for several months if the dam needs repair.

If you are new to the area, I'd ask around for the names of some good local excavators to come out and take a look. Heck, even if you've lived in the area for a long time, I'd try to find some good local excavators.

By the way, here in West Virginia, a good mobile home, like you describe, is known as a "Metal Mansion." We own one on seven acres, which is a few miles from our house/pond. We use as our "guest house" for friends and relatives. Our city friends love to tell tales of staying in our "mansion" for a weekend. (My college-professor brother-in-law, who has no problem mingling with crowds and wandering the streets of New York, Beijing, or New Delhi -- is afraid to sit on the Mansion's porch, in fear that a chipmunk, possum, or bear might attack!)

Keep us informed.

Ken

Anna:
I am so glad that we have such a smart girl joining the Pond Boss Family! You can post photos, you love animals, now you have a life long love (and science experiment) to boot. I'm sure it will become your passion, what could be better? You get to take the lemon and make lemonade!

What is nice in your case, it is YOURS to restore, unlike my CATastrophe, which is one of 6 lakes, ruled by an 11 member H.O. Assn. Board. GF LakeChair and I have had to take them all on, now have to manage 6 lakes to fix one. We ham and egg them all pretty good with the good cop (GF) bad cop (me) routine, I take all the heat, and I am good at it. GF is the proper professional. I have had the cops cruising my house, have been threatened to be sued, been slandered here in Urban Stepfordville Subdivision. The night she won the election I dropped her off crying at home, they were so mean to us, and all we do is love our lake! Fast forward 2 years, and the progress is amazing, and empowering, and interesting, and fun, and there are these Lake Treatment Boys of Summer (before we were prohibited to even talk to the bad lake treatment co), and traveling, it couldn't be better.

Fast forward to 2 years from now, and I bet your success will be just as good if not better! Let us know about the dreams, I wonder if it is a girl thing?

As far as the drinking, I feel your pain, we have found ourselves drinking during the day and taking medicine to sleep, now we just plan to party at all these great conferences. When we get out of here, we laugh the whole time, and can't keep our eye make up on from the tears, it is a blast!

Ken

LOL! That is funny! At first I considered the MM for use as a goat hutch but it is in such bad shape that they would probably demand improvements before using it for shelter. I can see it now, 130 lb Boer Goats picketing for better living conditions!

I called the local volunteer fire department and offered it to them as a training exercise. These guys came unglued! They are so excited to come and burn it down and when they found out about the pond they started talking about drafting water exercises they could practice too! These fellows obviously don't get much action and are beside themselves with glee to get to set something on fire and then practice putting it out. I will definitely take pics. A few years ago half of the department got arrested for arson. Seems they were setting fires so they would have something to do. A couple of them are still in the hoosegow.

BTW, our local extension office offers a "Pond Management" class. Do you think it is worth the time? Anyone attend one of these?

Catmom, I dreamed that I was in an inflatable rubber canoe in the middle of the pond and the dam broke. I ended up in a tall tree and had to parachute down. Why was I wearing a parachute in a canoe??? Gotta lay off that Cajun food before bed or maybe cut back to just one or two glasses of wine and not the whole bottle!

Anna:
Take any classes that you can, so interesting. Pond Boss is having a conference in Sept. in Mo., that isn't too far from you, then you can meet all these great experts and family members.
I love the dream, so vivid! It must be a girl thing! I haven't had any dreams in a couple of weeks, Margaret has some wild ones!
So instead of Lake Treatment guys, you have fire fighters? Not bad! That was easy!

Absolutely attend. The best thing about these gatherings is the contacts you will make.

Ken

I noticed how politly she DIDNT mention that most of the nutcases on here will probably be attending too.

You gals are cracking me up.

Anna:
Tom G grows vegetables in the winter, Brussell Sprouts! Burgermeister likes gut bomb hamburgers.GF Lake Chair will be coming aboard soon-she likes to drink wine and get her nails done. Her dog Cleo has her personality, and she is a nutritionist too, but for people, so you will hit it off! She is the perfect person to be the LakeChair. I was thinking, this is only a year and a half since we took over, before GF came along, I was fighting this battle alone, now we are sisters in arms! We have to kill all our fish soon, thanks to GF getting the survey done. Here you have to seize power to get the money to get it spent on your lake and deal with a lot of complainers that think the Treatment Co is the answer, they are only a piece of the puzzle.

Anna:
I had a nightmare last night! In this dream GF and I had someone out here measuring the lake with a tape measure cause our Boys of Summer couldn't do our lake anymore - In this dream I got my T-Shirt with their name on it in the mail, and when I tried it on it was like a dress, black and gold, how weird. I woke up in a cold sweat!

WOW. No need for such drastic action. Who recommend THAT???

If us forum members can't drink, bear arms and have dynamite then I'm telling you right now I quit!

And I'm quite sure TomG and Sunil will be right behind me.

What's next, ban Diet Mountain Dew?

Oh and I'd tell you about my dreams but I learned the hard way never to do that again. The last person that I told one of my dreams to immediately vomited and began weeping uncontrollably.

Took me a week to get the stain off of my favorite silk hawaiian shirt and Fatty McButterpants has never been the same since.

Lynda,

I'd tell you what Freud would say about that dream but we can't post it here.

Can a moderator get Bob off his big (diet) and respond to the newbie ladies' question?

Anna:
Don't burn down the "shack" quite yet, I may want to rent it.

bump for the pond boss.

girls, girls. Peace sign, love shack, correct spelling.

This is a good omen! The T-Shirt turned into a swim suit coverup and is a sure sign that your lakes will be happy and healthy soon. I took some pictures of the "Shack" and some new ones of the pond. I'll try to get them uploaded in a bit.

The Volunteer Fire Department came by yesterday. OH MY. They were a mismatched bunch. The group included one very nice simple older couple, a 20ish gargantuan corn fed hillbilly looking kid who kept snorting snot, burping and spitting and a younger skinny kid who looked, talked and acted like he needs ADD meds. The burping and spitting got so bad I was sure that neanderthal was going to rip off a fart at any minute.

All in all, they actually talked like they had good training and used lots of technical terms which put me more at ease. They are also going to burn the understory of 3 acres of pines as well as a large break of vines that we can't get through with the Bobcat. They are going to burn what remains of the grass in the pond basin too so that we can get a better idea of the terrain and what we are up against.

New pics coming in the next post.



I just put them away for now although the wine in the cabinet keeps calling to me. I may have to break down and drink it to get it to be quiet.

A picture is worth a thousand words.

Please don't post one.

Pot beads





Love Shack



Peace



Island



Pond Basin



Dock



Dock



Dollar Bonnet



Overflow pipe



View from Island



Pond basin



Cypress trees. Why do they have metal spikes around them?



Spring that feeds the pond



Duck boxes



Spring



Aidan Fergus, my new foster pup after a relaxing roll in the mud!!



Dock from above

Nice pics. Actually post all you want.

Anything but the VFD.

P.S. Re photo #1, we don't see many Ohio State University Buckeye Leaf Mardi Gras beads from Alabama.

Well, the wood duck boxes look pretty good

Seriously, Anna, you are surely sitting on a diamond in the rough. Like Burger says, if'n we can get Lusk to tear himself away from his salad with fat free dressing, you will have step one delivered and firmly in place.
btw, that metal mansion is an absolute classic.

I thought those were Hemp leaves. Glad you cleared that up for me!

Never would I chance shooting pics of the VFD. They might break my camera!

LOL. Now thats funny.

Theo must have edited my post and left me with a
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&rlz=1...nition&ct=title

Remember, burger, it's not the size of a man's participle that matters ...

...it's how far it dangles

Ba-Dump-Bump.

tssss...

You guys are hilarious!!

Thanks. You've been a wonderful audience.

We'll be back later for our 11:00 PM show.

Only Brettski can make the phrase "dangling participle" really mean something. Well, Theo did set him up rather nicely with that softball.

I'm glad you don't teach 7th grade grammar, Bski.

6th grade Forum-prep english under Professor Gallus really paid off

Was that a double nintendo?
Anna, please dont encourage them.
LUSK, LUSK...bail us out here! Theo, instead of lobbing underhands to Bski, you should be summoning the zoo keeper.

I'm beginning to think that Lusk does not exist. This place is like the Wizard of Oz. Lots of monkeys but no Wizard in sight! Maybe if I click my heels together and say "There's no place like a pond, there's no place like a pond..." The mighty Lusk will swoop in and transport me to pond nirvana where leaks do not exist and the fish are always biting. LOL!!

"We all love
The Old One."

Anna:
Lusk does exist, he is the wizard behind the curtain.
I love the love shack, my kind of place as long as there are no snakes??? If those walls could talk!
It just seems wrong: Fire Dept. in jail for Arson? They will have a rip-roaring time at your place Anna.
You are on your way to a really cool pond Anna, I just feel it.
Is anyone on the county level on the ball down there? If the fire dept. could use your pond for Training Exercises, maybe you could get some stimulus money for it? Our asst. City Manager told the council he applied for stimulus money for our drain that need to be diverted and storm drain vortex cleaning systems, but turns out he lied - we may have to picket them and get the photos in the paper before all the papers go out of business.

Men are so different. Hubby likes Red Cowboy Boots and a Tennis Racket. How about powder blue polka dot rubber knee boots and a fishing pole???

I am so glad to know that it is normal, you have no idea! Your idea is good girlfriend, go for it!

I couldnt agree more.A little burn here,a little effort there,and the place will be magnificent.

JHAP posted... WOW. No need for such drastic action. Who recommend THAT???

If us forum members can't drink, bear arms and have dynamite then I'm telling you right now I quit!

And I'm quite sure TomG and Sunil will be right behind me.

Not behind you,either beside or in front,woudnt want you to get shot by accident.And I'll have the beer,so you KNOW Sunil is coming along.And since the ladies have a good attitude and sense of humer,I guess a couple bottles of cabenet will be in order too>
Oh,and great pics by the way.

What's next, ban Diet Mountain Dew?

On second thought: get the stimulus money, and wear those beads in your photo.

Sounds like Hubby visits the same Haberdashery that I do.

anything to do with lonesome doves, Dave?

Awww man!! I don't qualify for 'Stimulus Money.'

I work!

But I do have these!!

Please, Tom, you are scaring my children.

"If Dad runs out of Dew, he'll go crazy and kill everyone."

The stimulus money could be used to set up a training program for the bored fire dept, infrastructure and safety training, they wouldn't have to be there all the time. Someone at the county level needs to get creative.

Wow!
Look what I missed for a week!
I just spent 30 minutes catching up on this thread. I've seen some hijacking before, but you all just adopted, corrupted and baptized Anna's thread....and made her a warm part of the Pond Boss family. I see a reunion in ya'lls future.
I wanna meet the fire department.
Oh...yes...back to the pond.
Since the pond is a key component to your land purchase, the first thing you need to do is have it evaluated.
Start with the NRCS (Natural Resources Conservation Service). They'll be in the USDA office in the county seat of that county. Have them come out and take a look-see. They are free. Their mission will be to tell you the status of the dam. They can tell you if it needs repairs, the best way to do it and how much dirt would need to be moved. Hopefully (I say "hopefully" because this agency is often understaffed and overworked and I hope you can get someone out there pretty quick), they can work up some specs and teach you what the "problem" is so you can speak with contractors with more knowledge in your hands.
Next, ask the NRCS who they suggest would be good to talk to about repairing the dam, or otherwise fixing the leak(s). They should give you a list of reputable contractors. If they don't recommend someone, press them a little bit.
Then, call two or three nearby earthmoving contractors and get them out there to see what needs to be done and give you an idea of cost. Here's the most important advice at this point. DON'T ASSUME THEIR ESTIMATED COSTS TO BE ACCURATE!!" They can't be. They really won't know the costs until they literally dig into the project. Assume the cost will be at least 25% higher than the highest estimate.
While all this is being done, call Southeastern Pond Management in Birmingham or Auburn, tell them your problems and ask their advice who to talk to. Tell them you have a leaking pond, where it is and that you are considering renovating the pond. Ask them for advice, too. They may be able to give you some good advice and refer you. You are building a network, here.
From there, decide what to do.
It may be a simple fix, it may be complicated, depending on the leak.
Here's short primer about the way ponds act. The minute a dam is finished and a pond begins to impound water, it begins to fight its way back to becoming land again. Over the years, silt accumulates, plants grow, then die and decay. The pond bottom builds up with soils and organic matter. Over a period of time, a pond becomes more shallow, then parts of it become a swamp, then different plants grow, the pond shrinks, becomes a shallow, marshy wetland and then begins to grow terrestrial plants again.
I've actually been around long enough to see this happen....
As pond managers, we want ponds, sans the aging.
Your pond looks like it's had a pretty long life. Most likely, the dam has either had tree roots cause voids in the dam, or burrowing animals such as nutria have dug through and created avenues for water to escape.
If that is the case, you will likely need heavy equipment in there to fix it.
If that's the case, study it thoroughly. You will have several options.
Option 1 is to repair the dam and let the pond refill.
Option 2 is to repair the dam and renovate the entire pond (probably the best option).
Option 3 is to cut the dam, bulldoze it down, go to another spot and build another pond (I've seen many instances where this cost's less money).
The first thing you need to do is make sure the dam can reasonably be fixed. That's why I advise to get the NRCS people out there. While they are there, have the NRCS evaluate the entire tract and advise you what other conservation measures you can take. That will help bring your thoughts into a plan and help you prioritize what you want to do.
In my mind's eye, it looks to me like you will do your due diligence, choose to renovate the entire pond and design it like you want it to be for the dogs, for recreation and for serenity.
And, I don't think it will be as expensive as you might fear.
For a 1.5 acre rural pond in Alabama, I would be surprised if it cost much more than $6,000 to renovate.

Anna:
With advice like that you have to be hooked, these guys are the pros and know what they are talking about. It will be beautiful, you never said if there were any fish in there now, or if there is a home on the property, a real home.

$6,000!!!!!! IS that all? I was having sleepless nights over $6,000?? I was thinking $20K!! Fencing is going to cost more than that. Wow! What a relief.

Thank you so much for the incredibly detailed reply. Today we visited the NRCS and the "Pond" person was out, we did leave our number and hope he calls soon. We asked about other programs and were told that there were 104 people ahead of us. But we were told we do qualify for WHIP, EQUIP and LIP. We also signed up with the USDA to get a farm number and stopped by the County Extension Office to talk about eradicating 7 acres of prickly pear cactus and returning it to pasture or grassland.

We came away with 10 soil sample boxes and a ton of brochures.

Our wants for the property are simple. To improve it aesthetically for our own use while being good stewards of the land with minimal damage/intrusion to the existing wildlife and ecosystem. If at some point in time we can find a way for the land itself to offset some of the costs involved that would be great too.

There is a rather large population of Gopher Tortoise on our property and while they are not yet considered threatened or endangered in our county, we do plan to try to preserve and improve their habitat. Anyone got experience with them?

There's no way I can end this without telling you about our Sunday. It all started with our first hostile wildlife encounter(and of course we left the gun home). This critter tried to come up the bank after us.

Meet our little friend.



So, I send hubby off to find an armed neighbor while I keep an eye on the snake. The first neighbor did not keep ordnance in the house (what???) so he went to the second neighbor, thinking it was Pete's house whom we had already met. Pete owns the annoying jackass who is the bane of existence for the whole neighborhood. This crazy jackass will not stay in his pasture and tears out fences, grazes in everyone's gardens and poor Pete has not been able to catch him since he bought and turned him loose two years ago. Turned out it was not Pete's house it was Mr. Smith's house and my was he a hoot. He's about 80 million years old, grizzled, thin as a rail and the old type of southern gentleman who wears his jeans starched with a crease and has a pack of Swisher Sweet cigars in his shirt pocket. Mr. Smith wobbles out of the truck, shotgun in hand and introduces himself as Catfish. While walking him across the damn I thought he was going to fall over, he was none too sure on his feet and stumbled several times. He is so frail the gun looked like it weighed more than him. When we got to the spot where the snake was, he kept squinting and saying he couldn't see it. This snake was at least 6' long and as big as my forearm! Then, without warning he says "Oh, I see em.", and blammo, blows his head clean off with one shot! We were really having our doubts about his eyesight and aim and darn if he did not surprise us.

After dispatching the snake we all sat down for a neighborly chat. The jackass came up in conversation and Catfish told us he had offered to shoot it for Pete but that he had declined. Pete's been trying to give him away for a year. Anyone who wants this varmint is free to have him, the catch is that they have to catch him. Anyone want a rogue donkey?

I'm telling you this is going to be quite the adventure. I'm so glad that I found this warm and humorous forum to share it all with. Thank you all for the help.

Oh and Bob, do you really want to meet the VFD? Arson article

Catmom there are some LMB and I have seen tadpoles and turltes. There is no house on the land yet except for the MM. We are going to build a two story barn and convert it into a house. We already have plans and hope to start by midsummer. Wish us luck and you know I will post pictures.

Anna:
What kind of snake is that? How creepy!!!!!!!! One thing about Michigan, we don't have a lot of snakes. Wonder how old he was, and if he has any friends? Now I bet you have a strange dream, in fact lots of strange dreams to come in the future.
My mom & stepdad lived in Cullman Alabama for a few years when they retired, (and in fact, the built a house with a big pond, but I was not interested in that at the time) is your place near there?

I think a Cottonmouth snake, but I could be wrong. We are in the very southeast corner of Alabama about 5 hours south of Cullman. We are in the coastal plain and are 10 miles from Florida and 20 miles from Georgia. If you know where Panama City Florida is, we are 70 miles due north.

IF the snake has any friends, I am afraid they will have to go too. I can't risk a dog or person being bitten. As much as I hate to kill anything, self preservation comes into play with these varmints.

Funny story, Anna. You have a special knack for spinning a yarn. Ya'll arent from Bama are you?

Anna, get your gun!

You must be psychic! How did you know?

Finally, someone else here to sing show tunes with.

Good! Since you made contact witht the NRCS, I'll give you the next piece of advice. Here's how to go from 104 to 50. CALL THEM or STOP BY about once every two to three weeks. That automatically moves you up the list. While most of the others on the "list" sit, show the NRCS that you are actually active with your property.
If you want to move up even higher than 50, stay friendly, call weekly, always smile over the phone and even invite them out for reasons other than what they do for a living.
Keep thinking along the lines of total stewardship. You are on the right track.
I, too, love the way you spin the yarns.
Sounds like we might have a new writer for Pond Boss. Journal your adventures.
Pond Boss is always up for writing about "real world" pond adventures.
If you are interested in writing a story, let me know and we'll talk about it.
Your story is fun to read.

Oh, yes...my favorite part of the arson story was the line "there are no fire hydrants in the area." Nice dig from the writer.

Do a search on Gopher Tortoise and you will find quite a bit of information. When planning out your property try and determine where they are digging their tunnels and try not to disturb (if at all possible) that area. You can plant various types of plants that tortoises like to eat. If there is a large population of them naturally at your place then all you really need to do is to not mess up their habitat too much. I use to raise several species of tortoises (never any Gopher Tortoise, they are highly protected in California).

NOTE: I am pretty sure JHAP means an Internet search, not a Forum search. -Theo

The characters are named and the stage is set! This will become an EPIC Theater of the Absurd!!!

We have life threatening action (Snakes, VFD)

We have adventure (Pete's Donkey)

We have Love (the Love Shack)

We have mystery and intrigue (VISITORS of the Love Shack)

We PROBABLY have deep, enlightening, and insightful conversations (No doubt plenty of herb has been consumed in the Love Shack)

We have a VERY solid plot (The dream of the beautiful restoration of the "Diamond in the rough")

We have side splitting, soda snorting comedy (the whole damn story!)


THIS is what Hollywood SHOULD look for!




Oh ya! HOWDY Anna! Sure glad you came!

Anna:
If you ever get rid of the beads, I want them, maybe a silent auction?

And this is my life! But there are a few more characters that will need to be developed as the story unfolds. Of course we have hubby. Bless his heart he is an Alabama transplant from San Francisco. The first time I took him Blueberry picking he asked me if he needed gloves! He's a complete green horn and a real city boy. He doesn't like to get dirty. Large learning curve coming on for him.

Then we have my six dogs who each have their own personalities and irrepressible sense of humor. Some days I think I only kept the ones with mental disabilities. They get into more mischief and cause more chaos than any bunch of hairy mongrels I know. I will develop them more fully as the story goes along.

We have the closest neighbors (that don't keep ordnance in the house), Don and Kammie, with a K. I don't know why she introduced herself that way? "I'm Kammie, with a K." Did she think I was going to send her a letter? This is Don's third marriage and apparently wife #2 got everything. I have a sneaking suspicion that Kammie (with a K) might have had something to do with that unfortunate turn of events. Don is an avid beer drinker and on the weekends you don't see him without a Miller Lite in his hand. Even for breakfast! They are a clean and neat couple in their early to mid forties.

Around the corner we have Wayne. He lives in a small brick house surrounded by an acre of junk! He does have two tractors and keeps the road clear and grated when the county forgets we exist. Wayne seems to be a nice, dependable simple sort of older country fellow. Always ready to lend a hand but not as agile as he was in his youth. I'd estimate him at around 60 something. When he smiles it looks like his teeth are too big for his head! He is something else but I think he will be a fast friend.

Then we have me. I'm a German transplant to Alabama via the Military. My father had two sons (my brothers who tied me to the clothes line and threw dog poop on me) but I was the one he took fishing and hunting and taught how to do most everything including operating power tools. He instilled a fearlessness in me that I cherish. I own a Health Food store for pets. So yes, I am a closet tree hugger. I'm the kind of person who takes bugs outside and sets them free rather than kill them and I recycle. I have to deal with people and their pets all day. Many of the pets have chronic or terminal illnesses and I help to develop diet and supplement programs for them to extend their quality of life. I also get to roll around on the floor with puppies and older dogs all day, so all in all I have a great job. Except that I work about 65 hours a week.

So the stage is set and the adventure begins. This is going to be one wild ride!

Start the bidding!

We could be cousins.

Did one of your brothers lose his shins in a boating accident?

Anna:
How much do you think the bidding should start at? I would love to present my annual report to our homeowners board wearing those beads. They fit right in with my mid-life crisis.

No? but I would love to hear that story! I bet it is up there with the Jeff Foxworthy tale about a guy who got his nipple bitten off by a Beaver!

You have a knack for telling stories, Anna. You could even make up your own pond-related Jeff Foxworthy jokes.

We can start with an old one:
Mr. Foxworthy, do you know why I pulled you over?
Well no sir, Mr. Foxworthy, it's not against the law to tow a boat on the highway.
But we do require you put it on a trailer.
Heck, you dropped your skier about 2 miles back there.

I would fill you in, but I promised never to tell that story in exchange for immunity from prosecution (and to remain in Grandpa Gallus' will). However, I did manage to get my cousin Stumpy Jack on the cover of PBMag one time.

I couldn't see the picture but I did subscribe, so now I want my fish Avatar! (Tapping foot) How do I get one?

For instructions on the "I subscribe" logo, see Cody's note and referral in the Archives.

Like this! Did you know you can steal just about anyone's avatar by simply right clicking it, choosing properties and cutting and pasting the web address into the [img] brackets? You can even use the images from their photobucket account without a problem.

Anna said "No? but I would love to hear that story! I bet it is up there with the Jeff Foxworthy tale about a guy who got his nipple bitten off by a Beaver!"

My mom and her sisters swear that their meanest brother(long deceased) got his dangling participle bitten by a male Red bird. (OK, cardinal)