Retraction of the Pond Pump Retraction

The new seal for the pond pump arrived on Monday.  I had already taken the pump apart so was ready to remove the faulty seal and replace with the new one.

The repair took about 45 minutes and was pretty easy to do.  I have the pump back in the pump pit and it's been pumping away for about 24 hours now and so far it's dry in the pit.

I certainly hope this isn't an ongoing saga...

Whoohoo!

Grow'n Faster Than Weeds!

They are grow'n fast. In an effort to show you how fast I took another picture of the gourd trellis from about the same spot as I took last Friday. Keep in mind that Friday was a mere 4 days ago... so much has changed in four days.

This is the picture I posted previously and was taken just last Friday... a mere 4 days ago!

This picture was taken this morning from the same spot as the one above.  Can this be the same trellis? Wowzer!!!

Some of the gourds seem to have taken on their own personality. A few examples below... if you have some names that might be appropriate then leave them in the comments section.

The milky skin of the Albino.

The hour glass figure of the sexy siren.

The wart like bump of the toad gourd.

This one has lots of options. For the blog,
however, I'll just call it the Buddah gourd.

This one has a small head and normal body. I'll
call it the politician gourd.

There you have the latest installment on the fast changing gourd trellis.

Whoohoo!!

Ding Dong - Gourd Bells

I just love my gourd trellis. It is one of the coolest things we've done this year and I'm sure we will do it again next year too.

The gourds are starting to grow like crazy. Everyday there are new ones dropping in. I swear that some days they are growing so fast you can almost see them getting bigger.  As the gourd trellis matures we are treated to various shapes and sizes of gourds and the trellis is filling out nicely.

Here are some pictures I took on Friday:

This is the biggest gourd we have so far. It's over a foot long.

One of the most interesting things, to me anyway, are the tendrils the wrap themselves around just
about anything they come in contact with. The look like organic springs.

Every now and then a baby gourd will start to grow and then die off. Haven't figured out why that
is but once they get about 3 or 4 inches long they continue to mature.

Whoohoo!

Pond Pump Project Retraction

I was feeling energized because the pond pump project went so well. The pump pumped and the water flowed nicely AND there were no leaks. There are currently no leaks as I had to remove the pump from the pump hole to keep it from filling the pump hole with water.  The damn thing leaked.

On the morning of the 5th day I went outside and looked into the pump hole (hmmm, maybe it should be called pump pit...) and there was a small area of wetness under the pump. A couple of hours later water was running out the bottom of the pump and the whole bottom of the hole/pit was wet.  I shut the pump off.

I talked to the guys at Performance Pro Pumps... a nice lot they are too. They said that 99 times out of 100 the leaks were caused by a failue in a seal (click here for bad seal joke xx).  They gave me a couple of options:

1. Return the pump and they would repair it and return it to me for no charge.
2. Take the pump to a local pump repair facility and they would pay for repairs.
3. They would send me a repair kit with instructions on how to put in a seal.

I selected option 3 as I've replaced axle seals on cars and figure the seal in a pump can't be that difficult. In addition, the factory guy, Eric, said it was pretty simple and he would be available for questions anytime... even gave me his personal cell phone number.

So the new seal is on it's way. The pump is sitting on my work bench. The algae is happy as a clam with all the calm warm water.

Boohoo...

Pond Pump Project Update

It's done! 

Since my last post about the "Pond Pump Project" I received my pump and then immediately moved on to plan "B."  Plan "B" was to extend the width of the pump hole. It's funny how things look when you envision them versus the reality of the finished product.

How the pump area looked before the new pump.

I found the pump fit in the hole OK but once in there I just didn't have enough room to get everything connected.  I knocked out the bricks on one end and got out my trusty orange shovel and with one more wheel barrow trip up the hill I have excavated another 8 or 9 inches of the hole.  This allowed me to slide the pump farther away from the skimmer and return pipe.

As you can see there isn't a lot of difference in the before and after.  It's kind of  disheartening to work so hard on an improvement and not have much to show for it

How the pump area looked after the new pump. 

The difference will be realized, I hope, next year when the string algae finds it harder live in my pond.

With almost all the work done (just a few nits to take care of) here is the detail of what is now living under my fake rock.

It must be one of Murphy's Laws that a large space becomes very small once you put something in it. None the less, the pump fits, the fake rock covers and protects the contents of the   

Pump Hole and there are no leaks. Let's hope the no leak statement doesn't have to be retracted. Inside this hole we have the Performance Pro High Flow 3/4 HP pump, the sprinkler controller that is used to insure the pond filler can't go crazy and flood the pond, the sprinkler valve and last but by no means least, is the hose that leads to Hector the spitter.

It's all compact and neat.  I'm like'n the way it turned out.

Of course if there are any problems or issues arising I'll be posting those little tid-bits of information on this very blog.

Whoohoo!!

Squash Bug Invasion

And all this time I thought a squash bug was any 'ol bug that you had stepped on. I was educated this past week when I saw fluid dripping from one of my gourd vines.

Stuff dripping from your plants are never a good sign and usually indicates something is about to die. It would be either the plant or the critter causing the plant such distress.

The first thing we saw were the eggs under some of the leaves.  These little "footballs" will hatch into baby squash bugs that will, in turn, eat. What they eat is the gourd plant or more precisely the gourd plant juice.

Any bug mess'n with my gourds is risking it's life.

There are all kinds of things to do for squash bugs and I found that most of the recommendations don't work.  I sprayed with Sevin.  Sprayed again and still the place looked like a union meeting of Squash Bug Local 86.

So these little gourd suckers were causing big problems with my gourd plants and I wasn't having much luck sending them to SBH (Squash Bug Heaven).

After 2 bottles of Sevin I had to admit they were getting the best of me so we reached out for some help. Ginger went to the nursery and asked their resident, "how does she know all this stuff," cops wife and all around nice lady, Mona.

Of course Mona knew what to do. She said we should take an hour and look at each leaf, paying special attention to the underside.  Also look on the vines. If we found eggs or hatchling's we should take some duct tape and press it to the eggs or hatchling's. The gourd leaves and vines/stalks have little "hairs" on them so things can't stick very well and when applying the duct tape they are easily removed and permanently stuck to the tape.

Now, if you come across an adult you do just like the name implies... you squash it, splat it, mash it, stomp on it, squish it and if you want you can duct tape it... just don't let any of them out alive.

That's what we did and it was amazing the number of eggs we found as well as hatchling's. Since the duct tape roundup I haven't found a single egg or squash bug anywhere. 

I'll keep my duct tape handy and will inspect regularly.  It's a pretty easy fix once you know what your supposed to do about the critters.

I love a story with a sad ending... for squash bugs.

Whoohoo.

Pond Pump Project

Could there ever be a year that I don't have something exciting to do in the pond maintenance arena? I guess I just have to wait till it's hot enough to fry green tomatoes on the raised garden bricks and then start a project.

As faithful frog-blog followers your aware that this year the string algae has attempted a coup to overthrow the balance between an attractive, peaceful pond with lily's and fish versus a green slimy swamp! To this end I have to admit the string algae has held the upper hand.  That, my friends, is going to stop real soon.

In my ever so humble opinion the string algae began the take over when I last replaced my pond pump. The replacement pump has been working diligently day after day, season after season however the water flow just isn't there to keep the string algae at bay.  I need faster flowing water and to attain that goal I can either make the pond volume less or increase the amount of water I pump from the skimmer pond up to the bio-falls. I'm going to pump more water.

The new pump is supposed to arrive via UPS on Tuesday.  I'm so excited.  So in preparation of the event I have dug a hole.

Yes my friends it took many wheelbarrow trips from my backyard, up the hill to the undeveloped land to dump the dirt I extracted from what will be my new pumps home.  It could only have been harder if the trip had been uphill BOTH WAY'S as it was when I used to walk to school.

This new pump is an external pump. That means it isn't submerged in the skimmer but lives outside the pond on dry land... in this case stuck in a hole next to the skimmer.

So without further ado I present to you the before and after pictures of my soon to be installed Artesian2 3/4 horsepower - high flow pump house or cave or hole.

This is the before picture. The reality of what really lived under
the fake rock.

The new and improved space under the fake rock.

The pump will sit cross-wise or from corner to corner.  The space without
the brick is what I'm calling the "future sump pump."  The sprinkler controller
is movable as it is on a bracket that hangs over the edge of the brick wall.

So there you have it folks.  I'll be updating the blog once the pump is installed... God willing and the hole doesn't fill up with water.

Whoohoo!!