Pond Pump Problems

Following unusual and increasingly strange noises from the pond pump and then noticing a lack of power,  Chris G retrieved it from the icy depths and diagnosed bearing troubles.  It went off to Lanes but, with its guarantee expired, a replacement had to be bought (gulp!)  Taking a pump out of a pond and replacing it is not that easy.  I'm not that good when it comes to electricity but I do know that it doesn't mix well with water and I didn't fancy retrieving a load of dead fish floating on the surface!  The fact that I confused the pump with the garden lights and was attempting to convince Chris that it was only low voltage.............as if!!!  His look said it all and in a flash (!) I realised my error.  A heavy duty pond pump couldn't possibly run on low voltage! 

The power cables have to be threaded through underwater pipes and then the hose needs attaching and much of this work takes place in the middle of the pond where the water is deepest balanced on a springy ladder with a very narrow plank! Then there are all the electrical connections and after that all the protective pipes then had to be recovered with pebbles and hidden from view.  Needless to say, he did a perfect job (with nothing dropped in the pond) and the pump is up and running so the fish have oxygenated water again.  Maybe, they won't eat the frog (or toad) spawn or the emerging tadpoles!

Pond Pump Probs

Retrieving the failed pump

Locating the failed pump

The pond pump started to sound suspiciously noisy before it just stopped a few days ago.  Fearing it had silted up, Chris came to the rescue and with a ladder and plank across the pond, he retrieved the failed pump and installed a replacement. We were keen to see why a year old pump should fail and it was pleasing to see that there was no evidence of silt whatsoever.  Instead, we found that the screw securing the impeller had become detached and dropped off! A ladder over the pond was an ideal opportunity to tip toe out and get a closer than usual shot of a water lily without falling in. Even the filter was dismantled and cleaned. After lunch work commenced on the Secret Steps Project.

The first lily of the year.

Pond Pump Probs!

 Since Open Gardens, we've had heavy rain and high winds every day!! Not the sort of weather you need the pond pump to fail! Chris Genever was nearby and 10 minutes later had disconnected and removed the offending pump!  A new one was ordered and so today Chris Pugh placed the replacement pump in position and reconnected the water pipes.  We now await further expertise to return it to full service.  The garden just doesn't seem the same without the sounds of trickling water!

It seemed a tad weird to be doing the usual Saturday seasonal garden work but without the pressure of open gardens.  Same jobs, same priorities just no pressure!  Chris gave the hedges a light trim, strimmed and edged.  I planted out some Nemesia, a couple of Phlox, Scabious, Sweet William and potted on a load of rooted Dianthus cuttings.

A small group of garden visitors are expected on Tuesday so lets hope the weather picks up for them!

Pugh's Precarious Pondwork!

Testing the equipment!

Lowering the pump

The weather was freezing and the wind biting.  What was Chris doing?  Re-siting the pond pump by in the icy depths in middle of the pond!!  He was the hero of the moment by lying outstretched on a ladder placed over the water - wishing it could have been rather wider!  He managed to keep his balance despite the weight of a heavy pump attached to an even heavier concrete slab in one hand!  Instead of lying on its side with pipes on view, the pump now sits upright out of sight and, hopefully secure.  Excess watercress was cleared, repairs to the frog's pipework were carried out and dogwoods were pruned.  Hopefully, the king cups and water lilies will bloom and further work will wait until the autumn.

Success!!

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IMPONDERABLE!

Just as the pond is settling down following very recent major rock placements, intensive weed removal, replanting and some very serious titivating..............the pump gives up the ghost. BIG SIGH!!!!  

A new one (gulp!) is on order and will hopefully be installed on Saturday. Meanwhile, I'm consoling myself with the fact that the broken pump has lasted 4 years and 1 month and it it's run for 8 hours a day so maybe I shouldn't complain.  It's just very BAD timing!

Here we have Chris installing the now broken pump: Pond Pump Installation 2014  Much water under the jetty!!

Looking settled

Fishy Business

Following a few pond problems resulting in the acquisition of a new pond pump back in May, Head Gardener and Chief Blogger failed to mention a sudden increase in pond life! A friend of Chris Genever's was seeking a new home for his fish. No one had accurate figures when it came to numbers of fish and I was only too happy to help out. Up until then we had only native fish in our pond - a few Rudd and a single Golden Tench. It came as a bit of a surprise when 7 buckets full to their brims with fish arrived! They took 3 or 4 days to settle in as to begin with, they kept throwing themselves out on to the pebbles. The entire surface was boiling with orange and white fish! A week later and all was calm and they all settled down.

In the intervening period, we have lost a total of 4 with a further 5 going to live in a much bigger pond at Paul's. The water appeared much muddier for a couple of weeks. The culprits were a pair of wild duck and we have found ourselves having to clean out the filter far more frequently which is a complete pain of a job due to its location - but, for now at least, things seem to have settled down. Fingers crossed!!

Fishy Newcomers!

Chris at work

Following a serious pond pump fail and all garden electrics being knocked out, a new one was ordered and Chris came and installed another replacement.  Now it's not easy working off a narrow ladder and the pump has to be installed in a plastic crate and weighted down with bricks which would easy to throw a chap off balance. Despite being ready with the camera, balance was maintained. 

Each item inside the crate had to be wired into its place to ensure there's no movement which might restrict the float switch. All went 'swimmingly' and  Chris then explained that an elderly acquaintance of his was seeking to re-home his fish. The upshot of this was Al arriving home yesterday afternoon with 7 (yes, 7!!) buckets full of fish!!  Suddenly the water in the pond was boiling with fish. Not having any knowledge of fish keeping, I wonder how our native pond fish will cope and if we should expect more visits from Monsieur Le 'Eron!

The weird thing about the newcomers was the fact that they kept swimming around in the most turbulent areas of water with some throwing themselves up on to the pebbled beach area then struggling to get themselves back in the water again!

Head of the pond

Friday was spent raising the stone retaining wall at the head of the pond and Sunday - replanting all the Dogwoods. Well it was a certain Chris Genever doing all the donkey work with me standing at the other side of the pond saying yes or no to a particular stone and it's position. It will make for much easier mowing as the grass is now level - less risk of the mower ending up in the pond.  Chris built a couple of natural looking stone steps as walking on the loose cobbles so close to the waters' edge was a tad precarious!  The pump has yet to be re-located and the pebbles need moving around in order to disguise the pipes and cables.  All this work hasn't deterred a duck and drake from making themselves at home on the pond.

LILY MONSTER

 Whilst the lilies are blooming in the posts and looking fabulous, down in the pond lurked a different kind of lily. A monster Lily!  A giant of a water lily which had grown SO huge its roots had lifted up the pump and its leaves covered every square inch of surface water.  It was so enormous there were far too many leaves to sit  flat so they grew upright and sat above the surface. It was a regular forest of   leaves! I wish I'd taken a photo of such congestion!

It was time for Chris to don on his waders and to go into battle!  It was a massive undertaking and he had to cut off sections of the monster root system in order to  be able to lift them out.  Sadly, this was when he discovered that he had mistakenly picked up the old leaky waders - not the shiny new pair!  He filled 5 wheelbarrows (2 of which were very large wheelbarrows) with its weighty root system. All of the barrows were too heavy for me to lift. 

Normally Chris rehomes plants but on this unique occasion, he decided that the compost heap was deserved along with invading Lysimachia & Symphytum - much of which I had removed from around the pond margins.

Once removed, a massive clear up job ensued, the pond was topped up and the muddy water is being allowed to settle and clear before the pump is switched back on.  The last job of the day was to remove a dying Acer Platanoides columnar so we has laft a bit of an unwanted gap around the pond margin.

Upon hearing of yesterday's exploits, we were contacted by our neighbours.  To cut a long story short, we invaded the compost heap and retrieved most of the water lily root sections filling large numbers of plastic trugs, loaded them into a car for rehoming in their newly dredged lake!!  The monster lives on!  We look forward to James sharing pictures of its new home.

Dead Frog and Frogspawn?

A fine warm day and time to finish tidying the pond.  Last week, Chris donned on waders, scooped out the rubbish from the bottom and we left it on the side for any newts etc to creep back into the water.  This week, it was cleaning out the filtration system and the pump as well as remove silt from the lights.  Rather than wading in (which would have stirred everything up again) Chris decided to do the ladder and plank trick and keep his feet dry!  In the meantime, I washed out all the bits inside the filter and then Chris washed out all the pipes to and from the filter, pond and culvert. I rescued as many pebbles as I could and dragged them back up the beach.  The trouble is; they all slide into the water when anyone walks on them! Having put everything back together again, we left things to settle before switching on the pump and went off to plant the remaining plants which had been laid in the veg patch and then Chris dug the whole lot and then raked it all level.  

It was when we returned to the pond to ensure the water was circulating reliably, that I spotted a real first. Frogspawn!!  Never before have we had frogspawn in the pond.  The strange coincidence was that Chris had found a dried frog corpse on lawn earlier - weird.  Let's hope we have loads of tadpoles and that the fish don't eat them all!!  Fingers crossed.

Pond Work

New home to the 7 Dogwoods

Spring weather means doing much needed tidying up around and in the pond.  Dead heading, weeding, pump maintenance and margin reshaping and planting.  The remaining 7 Dogwoods (Cornus Sanguinea) from the old greenhouse path - that didn't make the Aspen Grove have moved to the foot of the pond and the steep grassy bank has been reduced - it always was tricky to mow!  All that remains is some re-building of the stone work at the head of the pond and to re-site the pump, tubing and cables and to try to scoop out some of the leaf debris at the bottom.  Hopefully we won't disturb the King Cups which are ready to bloom and looking at their very best.

Balancing Garden Jobs!

At the end of a really busy day when it was really time to call it a day and have a beer (or, in my case, a G&T,) Chris appeared with ladders ready to remove the pond pump and see if there was any obvious reason for its unusually loud noise.  As it turned out, there was no apparent fault and the following day, it was replaced and the frog was cleaned allowing the pump to work more efficiently.  Chris balancing on a bouncy extended ladder hauling out a very heavy bucket of water with a concrete slab wired to it with one hand & no board on the ladder on which he could comfortably kneel was the reason for my mirth! 

Never Nothing to Do!!

 Never a week passes without fairly major seasonal jobs and/or repairs taking place in and around the garden.  This week, we had the pleasure of Chris Genever's company for a day which resulted in the empty compost bay being lined with reclaimed corrugated iron, a blockage in the pond pump removed and a connection tap being replaced, the potting shed door repaired, a couple of tiles in the greenhouse cut & laid and the rear door on the House for Hens repaired.

Chris Pugh and I barrowed a load of wood chip down to the Henclosure, Woodland Border path and Nutberry Noak before digging out nearly half a barrow full of Bindweed and Japanese Anemone in order to plant a Euphorbia subs. characias wulfenni Margery Fish Lambrook Gold. (Bindweed never makes the compost bay!)  I have high hopes for this plant following all the trouble we went to!! 

 With the newly lined compost bay, Chris spent the last half hour making a start on turning a year's accumulated compost into it.  Next year, the whole process begins again!