Some interesting developments, recently . . .
I heard a frog croaking in the last week or so. Where that came from, I have no idea. I can think of no colonisation sources, anywhere close. Quite a few mosquito larvae spotted, too.
Also, the water has turned a stronger greenish hue, in the last few days. It's been hellishly hot (late eighties, early nineties, with hot, desiccating winds) so that might explain it. I'll let nature take its course.
We've been round the edges of the island and the pond margins, in a little dingy - firing bentonite at spots we thought might be leaking.
After pumping water in on several occasions, only to see the level drop over the following 36 hours, I've given up on that and the level has steadied. I suppose a seasonal change and winter rains and time will be needed to get the levels up on a permanent basis.
We've reinstated the pump and pipework, to get the flowforms going again. The change up in size to a permanent 2 inch pipe was expected to increase the volume, but I wasn't expecting as much as I got. Wow! The pump is capable of 17000 litres an hour (4491 US gallons) at low heads and my guess is it's doing just that.
I had to re-grind the inwards races on the flowforms, to cope with the waterfalls going everywhere. Took several days to get the grinding dust out of my eyes and nose, despite the protective gear I was wearing.
There was a bit of water erosion where the bottom flowform emptied in to the pond, so we used some broken concrete to buttress around the sides of the concrete base. The bit of ribroof is only temporary, until the reinforcing has had a chance to stabilise.
In general, a pleasing outcome. My only regret is that it took so long to get to this stage. Too long. The lady whom this was meant for -
the love of my life - died in late 2009, not long after I'd started the project. The island has a dwarf magnolia tree as a centrepiece memorial to her.
A sort-of time-line, pond pictorial compendium can be scrolled through,
here.
