I went down to Home Depot and browsed until I found a square plastic container they called a "windowbox" planter, with no holes in the bottom. It's square, about 12-15" across, and about the same depth. For the grate, I picked up a grill meant as a replacement for a round bbq grill. The holes in this were quite large as compared to the gravel, so I covered it with some hardware cloth we had lying around, about 1/2" mesh. The whole grate assembly is painted with Rustoleum. I did a lot of searching for solar pumps and panels, and found only two real options for the pump in the size I wanted (fairly small, only about 2 ft max lift). One was inexpensive, about $100, but the company selling them had numerous horrible reviews related to product quality and customer service. The one I went with was just over $400 for pump plus panel. The product is excellent, and the customer service was excellent as well. I got the OASE solar fountain pump 70, and OASE solar module 10, from Pondlady.com. The panel came with a long enough cord that I was able to run the cord over to the house and up onto the roof, where we have the panel sitting. It's a small panel, about 12"x18" or so. If you build something like this with your big rock, Brenda, you'll want to be sure you get a reservoir big enough to catch all the water running down the side of the rock. Mine gets some splashing on the gravel that lets water escape from the system, so it might be a good idea to test the flow to see what sort of behavior you're going to get. I also found that if the grate wasn't perfectly level I had water run down the wires and drop outside the edge of the reservoir where the grate passed it. This could probably be resolved by just tying some drip wires around the edges of the grate (inside the edges of the reservoir) to direct the water down into the reservoir. And I can't take credit for the idea on this, Joe :-) I saw a similar thing at another garden and went and did a lot of web searching before finding out that this basic setup is something you can buy for big buckolas with all sorts of objects sitting on top, some really large. Lusty

Well now, I place new basins under bird feeders to encourage droppings on the new stone. My favorite is a finch feeder with black thistle seed (less of a weed problem). After moss begins to grow, the bird feeder can be removed. Although meant as a garden element to be a true chozubachi, I don't think I would ever rinse my mouth from these! A recently installed Japanese style garden is viewed from a bedroom deck. A double square basin with tsukubai seems to draw every bird species in the neighborhood with its subtle drip. Visitors are entranced watching the water trickle down and birds drinking from the basin, eyeing each other in a mutual temporary truce, with the more timid birds drinking from the tiny stream of water coming from the moss on the side of the basin.

I have a heated birdbath, the birdbath it'self is heated, not a devise I put in the bath. I have had it about 5 years and it works great. Mine has a thermostat in it so it will shut off if it is not freezing (but like you we stay pretty frozen for months. Mine is a deck mount right outside our living room window. It is the highlight of winter birdwatching and so needed by the birds. Mine was about $80.00. I just looked at Amizon.com under "heated birdbath" and saw a "tilt to clean" similar to mine for under $40.00

You might also consider using a cover for the connection between your extension cord and the heater cord to make sure the connection is watertight, particularly if it's buried in snow. These are two examples that are available online - I use similar ones I got somewhere (I don't remember where). Duncraft Cord Shield Farm Innovators CC-2 Cord Connect Water-Tight Cord Lock - Green Claire