Thanks for bumping. I am building the 18 gallon tote SWC. What is the middle smaller pipe for in the very first picture, filling ? I am thinking about putting the filler tube inside one of the corner 4" pvc support. Originally, I was going to put the 14 gallon tote inside the 18 gallon tote. This allows about 6 inches of space for aeration and water, which is plenty, even too much if you ask me. It seems 14 gallon is plenty of space for the mix. But I am thinking 4" is plenty for the aeration and water rather than 6". I don't mind filling every other day. It's only 5 containers and eventually probably set up automatic watering. Anyways, so there I was at lowes getting ready to buy the rubbermaid 14 gallon tote. Then I see the sale price for 18 gallon at $6 and 14 gallon at $7.47. Sheesh, paying more for less material. http://www.lowes.com/lowes/lkn?action=productList&N=4294961544&Ne=4294967294&Ntk=i_products&Ntt=rubbermaid+gallon So I decide I am just going to put one 18 gallon into another. I will use 5 piece of 4" X 4" support to allow more space for water but at the same time give almost 18 gallon of potting mix. There will be small gap the 18 now won't sit snug on top of the other one. Comments welcome.

Good morning! Happy Anniversary Mary and Dan! I hope Dan is feeling better...having wisdom teeth out can be brutal. Honey, it sounds like you are doing everything possible for Bullet. I hope you are able to have more quality time with your beautiful boy. Jerri, it sounds like you are up to your eyeballs in puppies. I hope you are able to find good homes for all of your little furry charges. I've been reading along....just don't have anything to add to the conversations. I've tried to write but everything sounds either boring or whiney and I'm not willing to subject everyone to my grumblings. :oD I've enjoyed seeing the birthday cards, the bird photos and all of the other photos. Right now everything here is a bit drab and doesn't entice me to pull out the camera. We got two more goats over the weekend. We usually would not be interested in bringing a couple of adult goats into our little 'herd', especially this time of year but the owners needed to find a good home for them as the husband was very recently given the diagnosis of ALS/Lou Gerhigs disease. They are having to sell their home & acreage so that they can move closer to family for help & support as the disease progresses. They are having to rehome most of their pets since they will be moving to urban southern California. I had a friend, that I spent a lot of time with, who died from ALS, so meeting these people and hearing of their devastation in getting this diagnosis has been difficult. I can visualize much of what they may encounter in the near future and it dredges up memories that make me incredibly sad. Well.....anyway. I wasn't going to be anything but upbeat. So....the new goats' names were difficult for us to remember so we've renamed them and now they are Tall and Wide. The male is very........well, he is very Tall and the female is very, very, very Wide. We thought the g'kids would find the names easy and they are fitting. They have always been confined to a barn and smallish paddock area unless they were taken out for a walk by the owners. They aren't sure at all about the wide open expanse of our pasture. We've been keeping them separated from the others during the night, they are in an enclosure that allows them to see the others, but keeps them from being bullied throughout the night hours so they can relax, let their guard down and get use to being around our 'critters'. Finally yesterday they went out to graze with Boo so that was a very positive step towards becoming part of the 'herd'. Our other 3 goats have not given them much notice other than to butt them to establish the pecking order. To see the jockeying for herd position has always been a bit sad in my eyes as I feel for the underdog (undergoat? lol)....but under these circumstances, knowing that they are frightened and probably a bit overwhelmed, I feel even more badly when I see that they are still not accepted by the others. I know time will make it better....but I want it to happen in hours instead of days/week(s). The previous owners were visibly upset (teary eyed) when we loaded the goats to take them home. They had raised these goats from kids, bottle fed them and the goats were considered comical pets that gave them much enjoyment to watch them kick up their heels, play and interact together. To have to find homes for your beloved pets (whether they be cats, dogs or even goats) when you don't want to give them up, nor do you want to give up your home, acreage and way of living because your world has been turned upside down.......it is awful. Okay, so I didn't stop...and that is where my mind is right now. Being an empathetic person is a good thing....having sympathy for others is a good thing.....compassion is very good......but it all has a tendency to hurt deeply. I guess I'd rather hurt then to not care, I just wish I dealt with it a little better. So.....anyway.....the twins are 4 months old already, finally not being bobble heads all of the time and they are cooing, squealing and generally being darn cute! Jamie is 3 and acting like it more often than not. His mom isn't letting him get away with much so hopefully he'll get through this stage --- soon?! LOL Guess that is it for here.... Hello to all.......hope it is a good day!

will the sand affect my pond life? Yes, but probably not a lot. Certain kinds of life, animal and plant, will make the sand home if they make it to your pond. What plant life should I add to feed my fish and welcome in other wildlife like frogs and dragonflies? That really depends on the person. I like to add any plant I can and see how it does. It stays if I like it. That's how I learn. So for me I'd try any plant, and I'd try it different ways...in water, in soil, in sun, in shade, etc., to learn how it grows. Duckweed is a plant fish will eat directly, but after they've eaten it all it's gone. So if you want an on going duckweed food source you have to protect some or easier imo is growing it in a separate shallow pond. But a more important food source is all the life in a pond, mainly insects. They eat the plants and the fish eat the insects. So all plants really feed fish indirectly. Dead, rotting plant material feeds insects the best. But many people don't like that in their pond...so it's really best to decide what kind of pond you want...Wildlife Pond, Water Garden or Koi Pond. That determines how plants are used. You can try one and if you don't like it you can change to another pretty easy or some pond in between. the water looks a little murky. (BONUS QUESTION) Is there any way to clean that up? It's pretty simple to clear up water but only after you know what's causing it to be murky which is the complex part. There are lots of filters and methods to removing different things so the filter has to be matched to the stuff being removed. One pretty universal murky clear is a 24/7 drip water change system. A drip emitter runs 24/7 into the pond and an overflow takes away the extra water. I plan on heading over to a local park nearby and yanking out a couple of cattails and whatever else I find interesting, I highly doubt it's illegal and the poor little stream that leads to the enormous carp pond is choking with all the vegetation. (OH! I know that these plants will probably have other bacteria and algae and critters on or in it, is there any way to clean them without killing them? There are chemical baths you can use, including chlorine and similar oxidizers. They aren't super effective imo. The question is do you want to do that or are all these critters something you want? You see this goes back to deciding what kind of pond you want. A Koi Pond owner with thousands of dollars worth of koi would never allow any plant within 10' of their pond. Their focus is koi and the risk of pathogen form plant would be unacceptable. At the other end of the pond spectrum a Wildlife Pond owner would welcome all those "pathogens". It's a matter of perspective. To these pond keepers "pathogen" is just another name for "life". That's what natural ponds are, life. Stuff killing and eating other stuff. I want to make sure the plants are settled before getting fish, but I heard that a certain string? Algae is a pain to get rid of, does that grow in zone 9?) You don't get rid of algae, you control it. Just like you weed a garden. Algae grows in all zones, from the poles to the equator. There are thousands of species. ...since I live in zone 9 in one of the cities that borders the Rio Grande, Does anyone have any recommendations for the type of plants I might want to scavenge for, how to transport and transplant them from the stream into my pond, and what no-no plants I should try to avoid? Giant Reed, Arundo donax, is a spectacular plant you can probably find. It's an aggressive grower, makes bamboo look like Pussy Willow. I don't believe there is such a thing as a no-no plant. They're plants, you're a human. I have to assume you can win any battle. Ponds are just like any garden. If you tend it you win. If you go away and come back in a year the plants win. (If I find any I kind of want some duckweed... is this a no-no plant? Will keeping the growth at bay turn into an overwhelming hassle for my medium-small sized pond?) Depends on how much hassle you consider keeping a pond is. For me it's a joy. And whether your fish.eat it. I want goldfish!! I hear commits are really friendly, but what other species can I add? Can someone supply a list? Oh, and how many can I add? (I was thinking about 6-8 fish total) Common, Comets, Shubunkin, Wakin. The fancy kinds can look a little out of place. I've had some of these because friends need to get rid of "pets" sometimes. They look a little odd to me when mixed with other kinds. Like when you feed them the others swim over fast and the Fantail seems to struggle to swim 10'. But the fancy ones seemed to do fine but need exact protection from streams, skimmers, etc., as they're not strong swimmers.. The Common, Comets and Shubunkin are also often crossed. Like a Comets and Shubunkin to get a Shubunkin with a long tail. Commons get the biggest, more than 12" and over 3' sometimes although these may be koi crosses. (Even numbers so they can have a buddy system, but not like Nohas ark, they can only be friends!! No babies!!... okay maybe a few so I can add them to future smaller water features around the garden...) You can post a sign explaining breeding rules but goldfish are either not very good readers or not very good rule followers (even worst than teenagers). which leads me to the after thought question... Can different species of goldfish mate? I mean.. they are still goldfish... Yes. When different kinds of goldfish breed the result is considered a goldfish too. Goldfish can also breed with koi. I know that bottom feeders won't eat all the gunk that will eventually fill the bottom, (I can't blame them) But are there any fish that I can add that will eat the bottom pellets? (Like catfish maybe, or something cooler/cuter) Pellets, as in sinking food pellets? Goldfish, koi, catfish, pretty much any fish will eat food on the bottom. There are terms like "bottom feeder" but that's just a general type thing. Like catfish will spend most of their time on the bottom but will eat food on the surface just like a goldfish or koi. And they will come a running when they see you just like goldfish and koi. As for gunk...bacteria lives there, bugs too which eat the bacteria, bigger bugs that eat the smaller bugs and fish root around in there looking for bugs to eat. It's a whole cycle thing. Gunk on the pond bottom is basically soil, or stuff on it's way to becoming soil. Nothing removes it completely, just like nothing removes soil completely. Stuff lives in it, eats some growing in it, breaks it down into better and better soil (from a plant's perspective). Oh, and is Walmart a smart place to buy these babies at? (I'm sure most are familiar with the store...) My only other option is PetCo... Are they a good option? I don't want to buy bad fish... but I would feel terrible if I had to take a fish back because it was sick or it got the others sick... There not really anything like a "good" store to by goldfish. Here's how it wroks. The store orders fish from a grower. The grower has a bunch of ponds with different kinds of fish. The grower puts a bunch of fish into a box and sends it to the store. The store dumps the box of fish into a big tank. An employee gets a net and scoops out a few of the the prettier fish and puts these into separate tanks. Like for instance some Shubunkins would go into a tank labeled "Shubunkin $4.95". And some orange and white Comets will often be labeled "Sarasa $4.95" even though they aren't actually Sarasa. The rest in the big tank are labeled "Feeder Goldfish 20 for $1". When customers buy $4.95 fishes the clerks grab a net and scoop a few more nicer looking fish out of the feeder tank and into the $4.95 tanks. People just assume when they see 10 fish in a nice aquarium at eye level that they must be higher quality and healthier fish than the horrible feeder fish tank. It's just marketing and logistics. You can often find very nice looking Shubunkins and Comets in the feeder tank. It just depends on what they get in. Growers don't care since it's just as easy to grow Commons or Comets or Shubunkins. They'll send whatever they have. The fancy goldfish may be shipped in separate containers. This is not to say all fish are healthy. In my experience 50% of feeder fish died in the first 24 hours. And in most stores they also don't last long either. Yes, you can quarantine them, you can treat them for parasites, etc. Depends on the kind of pond you want to keep. Most ponds I've had I only used feeder goldfish. Set up a quarantine tank and buy $10 worth of meds to treat $1 worth of fish...not me. I just put them into the pond and hope for the best. But that's me. I do want to hand feed my fish. I know the risks of them getting hurt by other animals but I have 3 small dogs that scare away all cats and wild animals, but are really just yapping balls of harmless fur. Pretty much all kinds of fish can be trained to be hand fed. Takes them a few times to get the idea but once they do they're trained. The 3 small dogs...I hate to impugn the K9 reputation for diligence but all that yapping..yeah, that's mostly for your benefit. When you're not around and the Herons are having brunch the dogs are really unlikely to do more than blink at the carnage. The Herons aren't hurting anything...it's not like they're doing something horrible like squeezing a squeaky toy. They're just eating all of your fish. Big woop. Now if the dogs happen to hear you at the front door then sure, they'll be off like a rocket to tear that Heron a new beak, jumping through plate glass windows, busting down doors, whatever it takes to impress you and keep those treats flowing.

I received my box from Faye today and wow! what a large box she sent stuffed full of goodies! I love everything she sent which included a beautiful tin "welcome" sign with flowers and a dragonfly, a darling patriotic cottage style windchime, a large pack of seed bags,plant ties,post it notes, sharpie markers, glitter glue, garden gloves, hand lotion, an "Outdoor Favorites Recipe Book" which my husband confiscated already, a great variety of wonderful candy and bouncing balls for the grandkids (they're gonna love them), and a bunch of different garden seeds which I can't wait to plant. And last but not least, the cutest card with an adorable puppy and kitty on the front with a surprise amazon MP3 gift card inside so I can purchase download my own favorite music! Perfect! I adore everything, but my favorite is the patriotic cottage style windchime! It matches my house style just right and how cute! You sent too much Faye. Everything is greatly appreciated. I would have chosen the same things if I were buying it for myself! You are such a great gardening friend! So thoughtful! Thank you, thank you, thank you! Sue N.