• Animals,  Bees,  Birding,  Gardening adventures,  Other Insects,  Permaculture and Edible Forest Gardening Adventures,  Ponds,  Reptiles and Amphibians,  Soil,  Worms

    Fall Morning

     

    The birdwatching garden.

    I use the kitchen table as a work center, but spend a lot of time not working.  That is because from the big dusty windowseat, through the spiderwebs that catch sunlight in the corners of the glass I watch a fairytale of animals.  Song sparrows with their formal stripes and classy single black breast spot hop along the uneven flagstone walkway.  The walkway, recently weeded, is again being compromised by sprouts.  The small pond wears a heavy scarf of peppermint along its north side, and a mixture of fescues and waterplants around the south.  A waterlily bravely floats pads on the still water after having been drastically thinned last month.  A calla lily opens partially white, partially green.

    Below the window in a dish of seed set low for ground feeders are house finches, the males’ proud red fading like the leaves of the Japanese maple behind the green bench.  Lesser goldfinches skeletonize the leaves of sunflowers that have sprouted from birdseed; a nuthatch and a mountain chickadee take turns on the hanging suet feeder, both noisy and reminding me of pine forests.  A pair of crows who have lived near this garden for years, but who have been about other business during the summer, are reunited on the telephone line.  She grooms his feathers and he leans into her.  I’ll have to put treats out for them, to keep on their good side.  A Nutall’s woodpecker looks like a childhood toy by hopping straight up the big pine.   I grin a welcome to a couple of white crowned sparrows, the forefront of the migratory flock.  These spirited and chatty birds shuffle leaves onto my walkway every morning, and I quite happily sweep the leaves back for the next round.  It is a ritual just between us.  A young scrub jay swoops in with much show, seeing how big a reaction he can get from startling the smaller birds clustering at the feeders or taking warm dirtbaths. He lands on a small trellis and pecks out seeds from a sunflower I propped up after its yellow glory faded.  Finches visit when he leaves and take their share of this high protein food.

    House finch nabbing sunflower seeds ( photo taken through a dirty window! Sorry!)

    The outside water is turned off; I should be on my knees in mud down by the chicken coop right now fixing a break in the pipe but I am held here by the autumnal light. Even in the morning it slants at a kinder angle, bringing out the gold in the leaves. Later when the water resumes the dripper on the bird bath will start and sparrows, finches, towhees and random visitors will sip drinks and take cleansing baths.  One of my favorite sights is watching a group of finches taking turns in the bath, daring each other to stay longer and become wetter.  Their splashing sends a cascade of drops into the sunlight.  They give Finch Frolic its name.  Now the only visitors are honeybees taking water to hydrate their honey.  I emphathize with these bees.  Only the older females do the pollen gathering, carrying heavy loads in their leg sacks back to the hive until they die in flight.  A useful life, but a strenuous and unimaginative one.

    Perhaps  today there will also be a house sparrow, or a common yellowthroat or a disagreeable California towhee, what everyone knows as a ’round headed brown bird’.  Or maybe the mockingbird will revisit the pyracantha berries, staking them out as his territory while finches steal them behind his back.  I hear the wrentit’s bouncey-ball call, but as they can throw their voices I usually don’t spot them.  Annas hummingbirds spend all their energy guarding the feeders, stopping to peer into the window to see if I’m a threat.  My black cat Rosie O’Grady stares back, slowly hunching, mouth twitching with a soft kecking sound as if she could hunt through a window. I see that the hanging tray of grape jelly needs to be taken in and washed because the orioles have all migrated. Rosie is given up by the hummingbird and instead she watches cat TV as the birds shuffle in the Mexican primrose below the window.

    I don’t see either of the bunnies this morning, Primrose or Clover.  They live under the rosemary bush, and perhaps in the large pile of compost in the corner of the yard.  I’ve watched them nibble the invasive Bermuda grass, and pull down stalks of weedy sow thistle and eat the flowers and seeds.  They do no harm here, and are helping with the weeding; I love watching them lope around the pathways living in cautious peace.

    Unseen by me by where I sit, mosquito fish, aquatic snails, dragonfly larvae, strange worms and small Pacific chorus frogs hang out in the pond and under the overhanging lips of flagstone I placed there just for them.   Under the plants are Western fence lizards big and small awaiting warmth from the sun to heat up the rocks so they may climb the highest stone in their territory and posture while the heat quickens their blood.  A mouse scurries between plants, capturing bits of birdseed scattered by the messy sparrows.  The soil is good here, full of worms and microbes and fungus.  Everything is full of life, if you only know how to look for it.  You can smell it.  You can feel it.

    Now comes the spotted towhee, black headed with white patterns on his wings and reddish sides.  Once called the rufous-sided towhee, he is bold and handsome, his call a long brash too-weeet.  He sassily zig-zags down the narrow flagstone pathway looking for bugs.

    Spotted Towhee grubbing in his fancy clothes, so bright after a molt.

    I haven’t seen the rat family for a few days.  The four youngsters invade the hanging feeders, tossing each other off and being juvenile delinquents.  At night I hear the screech of a barn owl, which might be my answer.

    The oxblood lilies – always a surprise during the dry and the heat of September, have almost all faded, but sprouts of paper white narcissus are beginning to break ground.  They are Fall flowers here, usually done by Thanksgiving.

    It is Fall.  Finally.  The world of my garden is tired and ready for a rest from the heat, the mating, the child rearing, the dryness, the search for diminishing food, the hiding so as not to become food.  Although the days here are still in the high 80’s the evenings bring coolness and a much-needed dampness.  Rain won’t come until November or later.  But we wait for it, the animals, the plants and I.  And time passes as I sit at the table and watch.  I know of no better way to spend an autumn morning.

  • Animals,  Chickens,  Gardening adventures,  Heirloom Plants,  Herbs,  Other Insects,  Permaculture and Edible Forest Gardening Adventures,  Photos,  Ponds,  Quail,  Vegetables

    What’s Happening in the July Garden

  • Gardening adventures,  Permaculture and Edible Forest Gardening Adventures,  Ponds

    Re-Ponding: Changing a lined pond into a natural pond

     

    Draining the pond with a hose syphon.

    The little upper pond which my daughter and I laboriously created about seven years ago has finally come to the end of its life.  Home to dragonflies, mosquito fish, snails, and some interesting black flatworms, and having provided habitat for snakes, birds, mice and frogs, this lined pond has been beautiful and most satisfactory.  Having been given the black flexible pond liner sheet, a lot of very heavy flagstone and some stones, we had cut down a juniper, dug out the roots in heavy clay and rocks, shaped the earth into ledges for nursery pots of waterlilies, and leveled the edges.  Everything I read about ponds said to put gravel into it, so against my better judgement I did, and immediately regretted it.  The gravel prevented me from walking barefoot in the pond, was a danger to the liner, made walking on the ledges in boots very slippery, and has trapped sediment and roots (end of anti-gravel rant).  The pond was aerated by a series of very expensive pond pumps, which trickled water down a little waterfall and impacted my electric bill.  This pond was a maintenance problem; I would pull out the algae (carefully picking through it to save trapped fish, snails and dragonfly larvae), but the waterlilies got the better of me.  I had no idea that they would grow so huge and disgusting underwater. (See my post The Monster in the Pond, March 2, 2010.)  Anyway, after the last pump died this summer, and after the enormous success of the two natural, unlined ponds Aquascape created for my permaculture gardens, I decided that I would change this pond into a natural one.

    Digging a shallow end for the pond.

    This area is also the one in which we do our Project FeederWatch bird count for Cornell (http://www.birds.cornell.edu/pfw/), and was our original National Wildlife Foundation Wildlife Habitat (http://www.nwf.org/At-Home.aspx ), which now has extended to our entire property.  I wanted a shallow end to the pond with planted waterplants that would clean the water and provide shallow habitat for all the Pacific chorus frogs that come up in late January to breed in the pond.  In fact, they’ve been croaking their way up the property already, so now I’m in a rush to get the pond finished for them.

    The liner was covered with a mat of plant roots and gravel.

    Once again I found myself moving large pieces of flagstone and rocks, although I’m seven years older than I was last time, and my back let me know it.  Then began the draining of the pond.  I tried to start a syphon the way I do to clean my fishtank, by sucking air through a hose and very, very quickly dropping it before I sample the water.  I couldn’t get it started. I did get an interesting circular red mark on my lips, which I had to explain that afternoon at my dentist appointment.  The difference in elevation between the top and bottom of the hose was not great enough, even though we put together all our hoses and strung them out down the property.  I tried to fill the hose with water, but it didn’t work.  A phone call to the pond expert, Jacob from Aquascape, made me slap my head with an exclaimed, “Duh!”  He recommended attaching the hose to a spigot, sending water through to the pond to fill the hose, then removing the end from the spigot.  The water would flow back and the vacuum would start the syphon.  Probably everyone in the world knows this, and I knew there was something about attaching a hose that I should do, but couldn’t figure out.  Anyway, it worked, but the syphon was a trickle.  After many starts and stops, and running back and forth up and down the property, my daughter and I discovered in the morning that the syphon had worked, and almost a quarter of the water had drained.  I kept restarting the syphon, until only about a quarter of the water was left.  The aroma of the sludgy water infiltrated the house and the yard.  I made a fire in the fireplace figuring that for once the smoke was a good thing!

    The monster in the pond, revisited.

    My dear daughter, before returning to college, tackled that monster in the pond.  The waterlily was so huge and slippery that she managed to break pieces off but not pull the whole thing out; in fact, she was in danger of being pulled in by it!

    Saving water lily chunks to make new plants.

    Today, with Jacob’s help (actually, he did most of it!), we pulled all the lilies out of the pond.  The root systems of the three, which had outgrown their meager nursery containers years ago, just about filled the bottom of the pond.  I scraped gravel up with my rubber-gloved hands and then began scooping the remaining water and sludge out with a bucket.

    An egret looks hopefully into the sludge.

    I threw the water onto the plants, and then when the sludge of decayed algae, plant material and soil became thick, I poured it over my bulb beds as a fertilizer.  There may be a high concentration of salts in the muck, but the nutrition value should be wonderful.  And it makes the ground around my bulbs a lovely black color!

    Sludge makes good fertilizer!

    I almost finished, half-bucketful at a time, hauling water up and out of the pond and onto various areas of the garden, and indeed I meant to finish.

    Scooping sludge into a bucket.

    But with about an inch or more of sludge to go, with yet more gravel to scoop, my body said, “Nope!  You’re done!”  I also had missed breakfast and had only snacked today, and had been exercising,  hiking, planting and weeding for the last few days so I told my self that I had a decent excuse to stop.  I took a long hot bath to soak the splashes of yuck off of me, and will continue into the muck and mire tomorrow.  Stay tuned!

    Our fat cat Pippin, who has nothing to do with this story!
  • Gardening adventures,  Permaculture and Edible Forest Gardening Adventures,  Ponds,  Rain Catching

    First Rain

    Rainfall on the pond

    The first week of October and we’re having a day of heavy rain… almost unbelievable.  Normally October in San Diego is high fire season.  The brush is crisp from months of drought and high temperatures, and then the Santa Ana winds begin: wild dry winds that blow east to west from the deserts, full of static and mad gusts that turn brush fires into firestorms.

    My property is a watershed, funneling rainwater from the street through to the streambed in the barranca below, taking all my topsoil and some of the embankment with it.  This year I had the beginnings of a permaculture garden installed to remedy this pattern.  By deepening the loam and placing berms around plant guilds water is encouraged to pool up and soak in rather than run off.  Overflow is channeled through a series of dry ponds which allow water to soak into the ground.  From there it is channeled safely down to an overflow into the stream.  Today was an early test of what has been worked on since Feb. 1.

    The tilling, mulching and berming done by the crew of landscape architect Roger Boddaert proved successful.

    Berms hold water back so that it may soak into the loam

    The soil has a high clay content, which was good news when digging the large pond because it held water without a liner.  It is bad news for other areas of the garden where water is pooling up instead of sinking in.  I was able to take note of these areas this afternoon so that they could be drained and mulched for more absorption.

    Aquascape, the company that installed the series of ponds, is still planting and maintaining the waterways.  Jacob came out in the rain and watched it flow, shaping and fortifying as the force of the rain and thus the volume increased.

    Jacob helping water flow

    Water flowed under the fence from the street, but instead of flooding a cement culvert as it used to do, it is channeled down to the ponds.

    Street run-off enters under the fence

     

     

    Blocked by debris, water floods past the bridge

     

    Silt and debris blocked water flow under the bridge, and was eroding the area by the structure called the Nest. I cleared the debris and raked rocks and silt to the weak side, and that fixed the problem temporarily.

     

    Rainwater flowing into the first 'dry' pond

     

    Water quickly filled the first dry pond; with the high clay content, water percolates but does it slowly.

     

    'Dry' ponds filling and slowing run-off

     

     

    Logs and rocks are ornamental and slow water flow

     

     

    Normally dry, the stone crossing is now almost underwater

     

    The little pond is rapidly filled.

    As water reached the small pond, which wasn’t intended to permanently hold water but the clay had a different idea, the sides had to be shored up and the overflow diverted.

     

    Water is diverted from the little pond around the big one

     

    Extra floodwaters aren’t being diverted into the large pond because we don’t want it filled with silt, and we don’t want it overflowing rapidly and eroding the sides. Instead the water flows through a channel around the large pond, then down to a prescribed place to flow out and over the embankment to the stream below.

    Overflow is channelled past the ponds and out to the natural stream below

     

     

    Some areas of heavy erosion had been filled and supported, and as of six this evening they looked wet but not iffy. What a night of heavy rain will do, I’ll have to see in the morning. I am very lucky to have this type of
    rain early in the season. It has been heavy enough to cause significant water flow to help shape the watercourse and show weak spots, and the rain will be reduced to showers tomorrow then clear up, so repairs and improvements can be made before true flooding happens later in the year or early in the next.

    Although much more water is being held on the property, and topsoil is not being lost, it still pains me to see so much rain channeled out to the stream. Rainwater is a neutral Ph, and carries nitrogen (especially when
    there is lightning). It is the best possible water for plants, as well as for human consumption and bathing. In side-by-side comparisons with tap water, plants watered with rainwater flourish far beyond the growth of the others. I’m greedy to hold that water onto my property, letting it soak as deeply as possible for tree roots to use far into the year. As the newly planted trees grow, their roots will help hold water and soil. As their leaves drop the mulch levels will raise, aided by compost and mulch that I will be constantly adding, and the soil will become more absorbent farther down. Each rain should have less runoff and more absorption. This rain has shown a great success with the garden, but I know it is only the beginning.

     

  • Chickens,  Gardening adventures,  Heirloom Plants,  Permaculture and Edible Forest Gardening Adventures,  Photos,  Ponds,  Rain Catching,  Vegetables,  Vegetarian

    The August Garden

    Plants have been enjoying the beautiful weather and the constant irrigation from the well, and the garden is flourishing.  So, unfortunately, is the Bermuda grass, but that is another tale.  Since I see it everyday I don’t notice the change so much, but when I show someone around I am thrilled all over again with the incredible change that has happened on this property.  There are so many birds, insects, reptiles and other animals either already here or scouting it out that I know the project is a success.  It is a habitat, not just for me and my family, but for native flora and fauna as well.  It wasn’t so long ago that I had a cracked, weedy asphalt driveway, a termite-ridden rickety porch that needed pest control, a house with a stinky deteriorating carpet and old splotchy paint, a tile kitchen counter with the grout gone in between and a cleaning nightmare, and a yard full of snails, weeds and Washingtonia palm trees, with the embankment eroding each rainfall.  Over the last four years we’ve survived some pretty intense construction projects (none of which were done on time, no matter what they promised!).  My house still has some repairs that need to be done but I no longer am embarrassed to have anyone over.  The  garden is wonderful to walk in and explore.  I’ve taken some photos this evening to show you how things are growing:

  • Gardening adventures,  Permaculture and Edible Forest Gardening Adventures,  Photos,  Vegetables,  Vegetarian

    My Gardens Today

    Entranceway with Running Dog

    April and May are months that I often don’t remember when reflecting back at the end of the year.  Spring is such a busy season.  When I was raising children, and when I was working as a school librarian, these months rushed past in the haste towards summer break.  As a gardener, Spring is one season when I turn into one of those Garden Designers London and since it is also the season of intense growth of both weeds and desirables, insects and increasing dryness, and for me and so many others, the inevitable allergies that keep me out of the garden for days.  So I thought I’d post photos of my gardens as they stand today, in the middle of April, on threshold of Summer.

    By the Front Door

    I’ll start at my front door and work downhill. The walkway to the front door is lined with purple lantana and a mixture of red geraniums, honeysuckle, butterfly bush and Double Delight rose.  It is being enjoyed by my very silly old dog General Mischief, who just realized that I was going to let him into the house.  He looks a bit like a vampire dog in this photo, though!

      By my front door I have a collection of miscellaneous plants, as most people do.  Two staghorn ferns given me by my mother have attached themselves in a very satisfactory way to the chain link fence.  There is also a dark red ivy geranium, needlepoint ivy, some bulbs just out of bloom, a traveling (or Egyptian) onion (it’s seeds are bulbets grown on the flower) that my brother gave to me, and some sedums.  When I water here I usually disturb a Pacific Chorus Frog or two.   I’ve thinned and weeded and replanted this collection, but there are always more that magically appear.  

    Front Pond

    The front yard pond is full of algae, but that is all right for the moment.  I don’t want a crystal clear pond; I want habitat.  Because of the clear blobs of  frog spawn and wriggling tadpoles hiding from the hungry mouths of the mosquito fish I keep the algae until it is no longer inhabited.   Waterlilies (even the monster one!  Look at other posts for an explaination) are blooming with last weekend’s sudden heat.  In the foreground are Jewel Mix nasturiums with heirloom tuberoses emerging, a grey mound of lamb’s ear which has begun to pop up where I don’t expect it, and rosemary by the bird feeders.  Our kitchen table has the view of the feeders, and it is from this yard that we count birds seasonally for Cornell University’s Project Feederwatch.   Oh, and try not to focus on the weeds, please.

    Side Gardens

    On the South side of my house I’ve painted the wall a Mediterranean blue to reduce the glare and create a colorful backdrop for flowers.  I keep annuals in this bed, along with some bulbs and a rose that is still small that my daughter gave to me.  In th photo just blooming are naturtium, alyssum, foxglove, pansies, and a delphinium that fell over and started growing upright again.  My library window overlooks this yard.  I was trying to keep the color scheme focusing on apricot to show up well agains the wall, but I end up planting whatever I want in here.  Cosmos have again reseeded and are starting to grow rapidly; they’ll block the window by summer and be full of goldfinches.  I’ve also planted a couple of bleeding hearts that I picked up in one of those bulb  packages at WalMart.  Usually the plant is pretty spent and they aren’t worth the money, but I somehow think that I am rescuing the poor thing.  These came up but haven’t yet bloomed. 

    Lady Banksia

    Along my driveway is a Lady Banksia rose that has taken off, along with a bush mallow, a Hidcote lavender, and a late daffodil.   Farther along the driveway (not shown) is a Pride of Madera (I love that name!) that is going gangbusters, a small liquidamber, rockrose, a mixture of natives and incidental plants such as a tomato that survived the winter, a Joseph’s Coat rose, and an established pine tree with a crow’s nest at the top.  There are other roses and plants here, too, like a prostrate pyracantha for berries, a white carpet rose, native milkweed for the Monarch butterflies (perennial ones; the annuals are usually gone by the time the butterflies migrate here), an apricot penstamon, aloe vera, and probably the kitchen sink, too, if I root around long enough.  I love tinkering around with this mess of plants, seeing what will grow and trying new combinations.

    Raised Vegetable Beds

    In my raised vegetable beds the peas have been producing well.  The shorter ones had been nibbled by crows as they were emerging, but after I put a rubber snake amongst them, the nibbling stopped.   Potatoes are nearing harvest time, and I’ve already snuck out a few new potatoes and they were very good.  Sometimes I’ve had potatoes with brown fiber in them and a bitter taste; no doubt due to irregular watering and soil problems.  I worked hard on improving my soil and giving it a boost with natural fertilizers from Gardens Alive.  There are so many peas in the garden because I planted all my old packets so that the roots will set nitrogen in the soil. 

    I also have growing carrots, broccoli, cilantro, parsley, endive, salad mix, parsnip, strawberries, blueberries, breadseed poppies, horseradish, asparagus, bush beans, fava beans, a yellow tomato and a red slicing tomato, garlic, shallots, red and white onions, Swiss chard, leeks, collards and basil.  Most are just small guys right now.   

    Seedlings

    In my temporary nursery area I have sprouting pickling cucumbers, zucchini, quinoa (first time!), more basil, Dukat dill, cantalope, and a cooking pumpkin.  I’ll sprout more squashes and maybe popcorn and sweet corn soon. 

    View up the Middle

    This is a view of the middle of my property, from the lower end up.    

    Palm Tree Walkway

    This is the palm tree walkway as it stands now.

    Pre-Pond

    And this is the lower area.  Notice the stakes in the ground and the tractors?  They are there because today is the day the ponds will be excavated!  The rain-catchment ponds, permanent habitat pond and swales will be carved, shaped and filled in the next two days, fed by water from a 4-inch well augered in the lower property.  I have hired Aquascape to create habitat and rain catchment ponds; the demostrations of their work look as if humans hadn’t messed with anything.  In about an hour from now, the action finally begins!  After the ponds are installed, then the final plant guilds will be established, the minor amount of irrigation installed, and that will be that!  I’ll keep you posted on pond development! 
  • Gardening adventures,  Permaculture and Edible Forest Gardening Adventures,  Photos

    The Monster in the Pond

    Ok, ok, I’ll succumb to popular demand and tell my pond story.  A number of years ago I came into possession of free pond liner and flagstone.  My daughter and I hacked down a juniper that had taken over our front yard, pickaxed out all the roots and rocks, and after watching many YouTube how-to videos, built our Perfect  Pond.   I indulged in  waterlilies, a priceylotus, and some other cute little water plants.  We set free a few mosquito fish, and enjoyed our organic water feature.  Well, it was better than we ever thought.  It attracted birds, dragonflies, and Pacific Chorus Frogs.  In fact, in early February, every frog in the county makes its way over to our little 400 gallon pond and begins their mating calls.  They are so loud that we’ve had to shine a flashlight out the window at night to quiet them down to hear a movie!   Soon we had evidence of amphibian genetic success.

    Frog spawn!  Then tadpoles, and tiny frogs that mostly disappeared somewhere until the following February.   The mosquito fish found similar romantic success and soon numbered in the hundreds. 

         Other than giving the non-human youth a Lover’s Lane, as it were, the pond had its ups and downs; the raccoons just loved getting in and knocking over the expensive lotus plant, so it never flourished.  Some very creepy flat-headed black wormy things appeared in the filter, the dragonfly larvae looked like the stars of  B-movies in miniature, and some of the plants tried to take over the world.  After a few years, I decided that there was too much plant growth and it needed to be thinned out.  With rubber gloves on hands and an explorer’s enthusiasm, I went in.  (Oh, and by the way, NEVER put pea gravel in your pond, no matter how many people say to on the Internet or in books.  It’s too sharp to stand on, it can wreck your liner with its pointy edges, and it makes a dead biomass on the bottom of your pond.  Thanks, I had to say it.  I hate pea gravel.   That’s my rant for the night.)

    So I was doing all right, standing in my knee boots, groping around under the murky water pulling and untangling long root and stem systems of these too-happy plants, when suddenly…. I felt something.  Something that wasn’t right.  Something that was too large to belong in our little pond with its one gallon happy plants in it.  Something that felt long and nobby like a huge slimy neckbone.  A monsterous, nobby, slimy neckbone.

    Now, I’m not a squemish person, nor one to back down at a challenge, but this THING was so not right that I was dropping it and getting my boots out of that pond pronto.  After watching to see if it had followed, and satisfied that it hadn’t taken offence, I decided on perhaps an abridged version of the ten-foot-pole ploy, and used a rake to gently heave it out of the water.  It was all tangled up in my wonderful waterlily leaves, so I tried to untangle as gently as I could, crooning soothingly to it as I worked.  Then, to my horror, I discovered that …. the monster neck WAS my sweet little waterlily!  How could that have happened?  In only three years!

    The one gallon black plastic pot had apparently fallen over (thank you, racoonies), and this plant wasn’t going to wimp out like the lotus.  Ohhhh no.  It grew out of the pot and made a U-turn heading back towards the light.  The neck was about 3 inches in diameter, about the size of a human’s, I’m guessing, but more alien.  Observing the true underwater nature of my waterlily made me feel like Rosemary of Rosemary’s Baby fame: my little darling was a slimy hideous monster.  So, I did the only rational thing I could think of.  I shoved the whole darn thing back into the pond, prodded it with the rake (the plant grabbed the tines, I know it did!) until I couldn’t see it anymore (the arch of the neck kept protruding from the water surface!  I had to almost beat it underwater).  Then I went in the house and had a hot bath to get the slime and smell off of me, and try to recooperate.  You bet  I locked the doors.

    In conclusion, the invasive pond plants were ripped out, I exchanged some water to help keep the biomass alive, and I learned something about myself.  I’m not afraid of black widow spiders, snakes, heights, caves, or blood.  I am, however, afraid of two things.  One has been a long-standing fear of high-school-aged students, dating back to before I even was one, and I don’t think anyone will challenge me on that one.  The other thing I’m afraid of is that waterlily in my pond.  Its been several years now since this incident, and under the water its been growing… growing….  I haven’t waded back in there since.