chas045, I tried to count them last fall ( in groups of 10 to make it easier to keep track of)when I was taking buckets of them to the pools in the basement. This spring I lost a few due to me not paying attention and some got caught in the filter and died. They had babies again this year but I cut back on feeding and the little baby ones from last year took care of the new babies of this year, almost like nature would.. I have 2 females ond 3 males golfish and of course all the babies which are getting big now to, I should of listened to my husband when he said no fish (lol) it sure would be alot less work, time and money oh well.... Thanks so much for your lovely comment on my pond... Sheri

I'm not a turtle expert, I'll leave that to someone else. I had never seen a tree frog in my area until I put in my pond and last summer I had 12 at a time walking on the siding of the house near it. You may want to try dwarf varieties of water lilies. Dwarf "Sioux" is one of my favorites, its 6" pads nearly cover my 5'x5' pond if I don't trim it back once or twice, and its a prolific bloomer (even when I forget to fertilize it). Water canna lilies are vigorous growers and good for your back wall. My dwarf gets 3-4' high, and one with nice varigated leaves would be 6-8' if it wasn't root-bound :) Pickeral rush comes in purple and white, dwarf and regular. My dwarfs get to be 1 1/2 - 2' high and bloom all summer. And you can't beat water iris for nice foliage to cover the wall too. I got a nice big handful of plants here on the exchange last spring and they were bursting from the 5 pots I planted by fall (about 3' tall). My dwarf papyrus tends to be slow starting, but maybe I'm not treating it right. Don't forget oxygenators for the fish, and I think Parrot Feather would be great in the top. Floaters like WH, water cress and water lettuce are wonderful filters. Bigger plants won't go over the falls, but azolla probably would. You might try a water forget-me-not tucked in the rocks, they love flowing water. If they spread too much you just rip out a bunch and compost it. Good to keep the fish load down - my 6 feeder goldfish equalled 28 in one short summer, so plan on sharing. Your pond is lovely, I can see why you stuck to your guns to have your vision come out just right! Good luck and happy spring!

Very nice island sundog! Both hardy and tropical lilies and lotus love sun. You could also give it some height by adding something like umbrella palm, pickerel rush, thalia. You could do some floating-type plants like duckweed, azolla, parrots feather. You could also do some Louisiana iris. So many possibilities! Have fun!

Thanks everyone for your kind words. To answer some questions: The dimensions are aprrox 9.5 feet at widest, 14.75 feet at longest. Deepest depth 3ft, average is probably about 2 feet. The gallonage is probably somewhere between 1700 and 2000. The rocks are something called "Avondale Brown" fieldstone, since I live relatively close to the Avondale, PA quarry. We purchased two pallets (3 tons) of regular fieldstone, then hand picked four or five large flat rocks from a local stone and landscape place for the waterfall. The final result of the rock border took a long time to place. You can see in the other pictures our first attempts did not look so great. I give all the credit to my fiance. She hand picked each and every rock for the walls so they fit together perfectly.