pond – Page 4 – Rippled Effects

June 16, 2008June 16, 2008

Weekends at the pond

Weekends at our home bring us into the outdoors, working on the various flower beds, the house (yes, those gutters were full of oak tree droppings according to hubby), the veggie garden,etc. But, the best of all is working around and in the pond and observing the parts of mother nature that we share it with. The pond aquaculture has stabilized a bit from early spring and the slimy algae is all but gone. Of course, it’s being replaced by string algae, but that’s more easily removed from the pond and does not obscure the clarity of the water like the slimy stuff does. The new fish are growing more tame — coming nearer and nearer my hand at feeding time. Yesterday, the bravest one actually took a piece of food directly from my fingertips. He is the most brave and seems to be the most hungry, swimming quickly around and sucking up a lot of food pellets. I’ve named him Hoover (after the vacuum, not the president). The others are coming directly to my hand as I place it in the water but they insist on waiting until the food has been released and they can grab it off the top of the water. It’s really fun to watch them feed and my patience is being rewarded by increasingly friendly fish. We feed them at nearly the same time every day and they are quickly learning about telling time too. They start swimming around near the feeding rock and checking it out starting about an hour or so before the appointed time.

The waterlilies are blooming — absolutely beautiful — one plant is white, the other yellow.

And Phinneas is back this year. Hubby named him Gurk after he first appeared this spring. But he is so large and so tame and his markings are so familiar that I am pretty sure that he is Phinneas back for his third year with us here at the pond. He appeared at the water’s edge the very first weekend the pond was full two years ago this fall. Who knows where he came from or how he knew there was a pond being built that he could call home, but there he was. You can see in this photo how his coloring matches the green of the algae covered rock he is sitting on at the water’s edge. No wonder I cannot find him at times when I’m out visiting the pond. When I go out to feed the fish, I call to them and talk to them to coax them out from under the floating plants. Gurk/Phinneas almost always starts talking to me and responding to my voice. Hubby has read, and is convinced, that if I go to the pet store and get some live insects that I could train him to come to my hand for feeding also. Hmmmmmmmmmm…….

$Here\'s lookin at ya\'$

So, while others get into their cars for long drives to their weekend spots, we will be gleefully weekending at the pond.

May 15, 2008May 15, 2008

Crazy Fish

Our new fish are still somewhat shy, but in the last couple of days have begun to be a little less afraid of us when we are near the pond. For the last two days they have been swimming swiftly around the pond in circles around the plants, through the cave, past the skimmer, under the floating plants, under the waterfall, and just around and around. It sometimes looks like they are playing tag, but I cannot figure out what the rules are. Hubby has read that this fast swimming and what appears to be chasing of each other is spawning behavior. I call them my crazy fish. It does look like they are having glorious fun swimming in their new pond. When I am out near the pond they won’t come very near the top. I did manage to catch all 5 of them together in the bottom (with my camera of course!).

And, just for fun, I sat the ceramic frogs next to the frog spitter and they are now out there keeping an eye on my crazy fish. The ceramic frogs were birthday gifts for hubby and me for our birthdays last year — made by my sister. The middle one looks a little fierce, doesn’t he? Perhaps we can have her make us a smiley frog this year.

May 12, 2008May 12, 2008

Pink snow

Spring has been very cold here in Connecticut but this has seemed to make the blooming trees hang onto their beauty for longer than usual. Well, today — they are really letting go of their “beauty”. We have a Kwanzan cherry right outside our front door. This means it is also right next to our pond and waterfalls. We were supposed to have a storm today with lots of rain, but all we are getting is the wind. The big puffy pink blooms are being blown off the cherry tree in enormous quantities.

There is “pink snow” everywhere — sidewalks, flower beds, front steps, my bench, my flower pots, and unfortunately, the pond.

The petals from the blooms, and in some cases entire blooms, are filling the pond surface, being drawn into the skimmer for the pump, and eventually getting so thick that they are stopping the flow of water into the pump. Talk about your ripple effects!

Hubby turned off the pump this morning as he left for work and I headed off to a quilt guild meeting. But now I’m back home having used the leaf blower to blow away some of the “snow’, used the net to skim the top of the pond, and turned the pump back on. I’ve set a timer and every 20 minutes I go out and check the skimmer net — turn off the pump — clear the net — turn on the pump — come back in and reset the timer. I’m using this as an excuse to sit in the living room where I can hear the waterfalls and knit — claiming I cannot get anything else done in 20 minute intervals. So my summer vest is making good progress (I may even get it done before summer) and the pond is being taken care of. Note that, during this whole time, the fish are nowhere to be seen. They are still quite shy in their new home and I’m guessing that they are at the bottom of the pond in their cave wondering why the waterfall keeps going off and back on.

Here’s the vest front — in progress — ready for armhole shaping.

May 3, 2008May 3, 2008

Welcome!

Welcome to the Rippled Effects blog. Here you will find some random thoughts, some notes on my various activities (knitting, quilting, stained glass, music, gardening, photography, ……. I could go on and on) and some musings on the effects of our actions, big and small, as they ripple through the world around us.

And to start things off, here is today’s photo — the “launching” of the new fish into our garden pond. After a disastrous winter where all the fish in the pond came floating to the top of the pond, one by one, we have added six new fish to the pond today. Here some of them are — Half-and-Half being the third one out of the plastic bag into the pond.

Tomorrow, we will be anxiously checking on our new BFFs (Best Fish Friends) to watch their adjustment to their new home. It is wonderful to see fish in the pond again. Welcome to your new home guys!