There are a number of ways to make keeping your pond maintenance more efficient without the outrageous price your handyman puts on the job. The first problem of fine leaved Honey Locust leaves could be solved by making a screen sided or mesh sided basket to put into the top section of the pond to collect the leaves. Just leave it in place between cleanings. If you are handy, the screen sided bucket is simple enough but premade mesh fish nets come in some rather large sizes and shaping the handle to serve as a cup type handle is easy enough as is making some sort of shelf to hold the net in place. Just lift the net out by the handle, let the water drain back if it is sufficiently clear and dump the leaves out. I am putting in a link for a website that happens to show several products on the same page that would do a good job of cleaning the mulm under the bottom drain. The fish capture nets are there, too. The Muck Vac is about as simple as it gets. The price is a bit steep but it works. All you need is 50 lbs water pressure in the hose. The leaf vac uses a bag to catch debris and I use one to collect leaves on the bottom. It isn't as good for mulm unless you get the extra bags for that purpose. The price is hard to beat. It adds water to your pond so prepare as for a water change. The Python pond vac is a more elaborate version of the Muck vac designed to collect leaves and mulm. It is more difficult to get into tight places and I have a problem opening and closing the jar that collects the debris because my hands hurt a lot. The pond vacuum on this page is pretty expensive but you can get a garage(utility)vac with a continuous flow(water)discharge for between $75 and $90. It works, too. Just add a hose to run the water to the garden. I got one at Walmart and I've seen them at Lowes, Menards, etc. It took me a while to get the hang of it but Horton came through for me with proper instructions. UV, UV. Hum-mm. I don't see anywhere the flow rate would be low enough to let the UV work. I see you have valves all through the system that makes in-line space at a premium even if it lets you adjust the flow. It seems to me that adding another pipe with a valve to control that flow would make the system complicated to the point of maintenance inefficiency and it would certainly raise the scream level. Maybe I am wrong. Since you are going to move, I would use a small submersible pump and a stand alone UV + filter. It might even be possible to get by with only the sponge included prefilter to protect the pump. The object is to increase dwell time to allow the UV time to work. You can get small fountain pumps for cheap. Try Harbour Freight.I found the UV and filter from Laguna on sale for 45 bucks. several years ago. That screwdriver must be a sign of ingenuity or ineptitude. I don't know which. One of these days you will laugh at it. In a number of stores I see wire shelves that are stackable in the laundry and storage departments. I don't see how deep the hole is but I bet you could find one of those shelves that would fit close enough. You might need to do a bit of bending or cutting. Please do not put stones on the bottom of the pond. It will make cleaning an impossible task and eventually the water will become stinky. Now I will let the smart guys take over. I still like your pond. Sandy Here is a link that might be useful: Simple inexpensive ideas that work well

On pure aesthetics the lower example pleased my eye more, and then I read your post! Imagine that .... I'll tell you what would please my eye even more -- being able to see myself! (vanity, thy name is ME) I think it's a more interesting composition having the mirror lower, and I think it's even more interesting if you're able to see yourself. But scrolling back up and reading others responses I am just one in a long line who feels this way. How do you feel? And on a totally different topic, I am so envious of your grand piano. I play exceedingly poorly and I've lived without a piano for years, but a girl can dream .... My two year-old has recently discovered the piano (at a little play class we take together), and watching him tickle (okay, pound) the ivories made me emotional. (I'm studying the banjo and already the two year-old makes prettier sounds on it than I!) So with your outdoor fireplace and your indoor piano I am going to live vicariously through you! amysrq, my hero!

graywings and dekeboe. Thank you for the response. They were on sale for $37 a panel. I have not received them yet but I have been shopping around and have not seen anything I like. I have some mobility issues and I'm just so tired of looking. I thought they were a bit pricey too but if they look nice I think it will be worth it.Oakleyok and design79 I wish I COULD SEW! It would save me so much money. I can't even run a hem.

You can let go of the stressing out since IME Clematis are quite resilient. The pruning group gives you guidelines to maximize bloom, but if you don't do it correctly, the plant will still grow. You are right that Nelly Moser is one of the clematis that blooms on old and new wood (type 2). The buds you are seeing right now were set last season on old wood. The new growth is the two long stems that are getting longer and probably started from old stems. You may also have some new stems emerging from the base of the plant, or some of your other stems may also send up new growth. You can either let the stems continue to grow and there may be more stems to join it as the season continues, or you can clip off the growing tip of the two stems to see if they will branch out more. I imagine that your plant must have been good-sized to start with to be so large and vigorous in its second season in your garden! Where I am, sometimes my entire type two plants get pruned by cold to ground level, and they send up stems and bloom just fine, but a bit later than usual. Other seasons they bloom on old wood. My season doesn't seem to be long enough for fall bloom, however, so the September bloom is a bonus for you. There's an FAQ on pruning Clematis, and another good resource is Clematis on the Web. You can type in part of the clematis name (the search engine doesn't like spaces so only put in one word) leaving the rest blank, and it will give you basic information on that specific variety, or you can instead supply other information to find plants that fit your requirements such as size, color, pruning type, etc. to get a list of plants you might want to check out.