Hi bk, I wrote because I pondered doing the same thing for a couple of years before I learned enough to know better for what I wanted. There is not enough information to really help, but some things you need to be aware of are: *Your soil type: some silts are known for "self piping". That means water will find it's way out of/around anything without an impermeable liner.(I happen to have such a soil) *Run off is always uncontrolled, so you need to understand that water will try to get under/around the start of your collection point. There is really no way to avoid this, and it will require regular maintenance just like a roadside culvert. The water eats around the perimeters and it eventually has to be rebuilt. A hard and deep footer delays the onset of the erosion which will still continue, and be more severe with greater amounts of water. *Runoff is also fraught with quality issues because it is uncontrolled. You should not try to keep any expensive fish. *If you don't line the vessel (pond), you can not effectively clean it. If you are concerned about build up of water below the liner, put a drain tile below the vessel, and weight on the liner such as stone (and water of course!). *Silt coming down the drainage may be the toughest issue as you do not know how much, when, or what it contains. Washing the liner will fix the silt in pond area, but the pond will never achieve a balance. (And might not anyway due to the other charactaristics of runoff.) *It sounds like you are tampering with a natural drainage that may be regulated. One day you may be told to remove all your work. I suggest you check into this further before you start. If I "had" to do this, would go with the liner and the drain tile below the pond, capped on the upside beyond the edge of the vessel, and before the point of capture by several feet. The tile would be set in a trench lined with geotextile, and drain rock around the pipe. I would also set a footer for the collection point to hold back the dirt and guide the water to a channel onto the pond liner, with the liner coming up from the pond and over the edge of the footer as a start point/collection point. BUT-If I wanted a pond, I would build it independently of the drainage, and route the drainage around/under it with piping if that's where it "had" to be. Otherwise, I would build it on higher ground, off the drainage route entirely, and enjoy an all around, more stable situation in my pond! Using the drainage seems like a good idea at first, but the more you look into it, the less appealing it becomes if you in fact want a pond. If you really don;t want a pond, but just a place for frogs to congregate in your drainage, it can be made to work, it will just be constant physical maintenence and never be stable. -TT

Conratulations on your decision to remove the invasive pest from your allee. As you can see their performance in the landscape is often not so great either. You'd be doing the right thing and especially not to patronize the industry any more for those norway maples. For every one norway maple you buy, they will produce 5 more. Makes me want to scream. Last year I planted a London Planetree 'Yarwood' that I bought from a local grower in a 2.5" size and approximately 24' tall for around $100. I've wanted a sycamore-like tree on my street since I saw the ones in Julie's tree diary (treegrowersdiary.com) I replaced a Zelkova that was planted by the builder and had lost all its branches in a variety of storms. This bark on the yarwood is very white and mottled. More so than native sycamore which I would have planted if I could have found one. This year it looks like it's grown another inch in caliper! Got stunned by the Easter Freeze unfortunately. London plane does have a different mature size and slightly different habit than native American Sycamore. It is more rounded and not quite so tall from what I've read. I'm pleased with it so far and can't wait til it drapes over the street. I think you will be happy with it too although I would suggest, as usual, a mixed planting. Maybe drop some LP's here and a little oak there and some elm over there. You see so there is some protection against a total wipeout.

Bee, Crape myrtle murder is a very common (unfortunately!) practice of repetitively topping crape myrtles year after year, leaving horribly scarred branches that look worse and worse over time. It is incredibly common in places like mall or shopping center parking lots. When new homeowners buy a place with a crape myrtle or plant one in their yard, they often copy that type of pruning because they've seen it so often they think it must be the correct way to prune crape myrtles. Horticulturalists have been fighting the practice of crape murder for at least a couple of decades, but not many people seem to be listening to them. I can't remember where Tim and I were last week, but we actually were in a parking lot where the crape myrtles had not been murdered, and they looked so much better with their natural shape, as opposed to the crape murdered ones, which often have a sort of bonsai-looking top on otherwise normal looking multiple trunks. I'll link an article by one widely-respected Texas horticulturalist, Greg Grant, but you can find a million more with similar info by googling. When you look at the photos in his article, you'll see where the branches have been cut in the same place year after year. When the branches are cut, the plants put out new growth just beyond that cut, and then the murderous pruners come and cut back at the same spot the next year and the next, and the tree keeps putting out new growth. Eventually you get the scarred-looking branches as the photos show. Gardening is a process in which you never stop learning and I think the easiest way to learn it is just by doing it. Reading about it endlessly will put a lot of info in your head, but a lot of the time, that info isn't very helpful until you've encountered a situation where you put what you read into use. You never stop learning and you never stop finding new techniques or better techniques that suit whatever situation you're dealing with.You do something and you learn from it either way....either you learn it works and that you like it and that you'll use that technique again in the future. Or, you learn it doesn't work as well as you'd hoped, or you think there's a better way, so the next time you try something different. Eventually you will discovered you have found what works best for you with the plants you have in your soil, your location, your climate, etc. Then, if you are like most Americans, at some point you move and start all over again with different soil, different plants and a different location, and then you have to figure out what works best there where you are with what you have. I think all that learning keeps gardeners' brains and bodies young. Dawn Here is a link that might be useful: Greg Grant Article on Crape Myrtles

We currently have two TOTO Ultramax and we LOVE them. I just purchased my 3rd TOTO online. I bought a skirted toilet that will be easier to clean w/o the nooks and crannies. Our family owned many expensive American Standards, Kohler and other crap brands and had problems with all them clogging (several times a day). The plumber felt bad taking our $$$ that he finally told us to buy a TOTO or Gerber. We've been problem free for the last 3 years and no longer own a plunger or a snake. You will not find TOTO in HD or Lowes, only at high end plumbing stores. You can find the Kohler Kathryn at either Lowes.