Yard work.
I whacked up some more of the hawthorn branches. Loppers and chainsaw. WHich had my back protesting
Jane and I sat in the dirt, extricated river rocks (largish) that the fence crew had buried under excavated dirt. We flung the big ones into the lotus pond pit, (new, as yet not done) and the pebbles into a flower pot and the mediums into a trug, which became 2 trugs. I then hosed out the filter for the pond and took a dead bamboo out of a massive pot—while Jane hauled brick and gravel to try to cover the new water line we are hose-splicing to the back of the hard. [Hard pipe connected to a garden hose leading to the spigot, so it can be drained for winter. But it has a proper spigot out in the end of the garden. And will supply the lotus pond.]
I also ordered a filter for the lotus pond, and a pump. We are making a little stream that runs from a water fall in the corner to the lotus pond, and there will be sitting areas and flowers and some decorative arches. It’s about a 25×25 area made by the garage, and the property line, and we now have it scheduled to be beautiful.
There will indeed be a lotus someday.
Hopefully the blue one, who’s scent relieves pain?
Try an OSHA belt for those back problems. Works for me.
Let me know if you need seeds; I don’t know if I could ship tubers.
THanks,all!
Chondrite, I fear our zone 5-6 weather would do in a tropical one, but I would love to try. We do have a few, mostly white, that will survive if deep enough. Our ground-freeze only goes about half a foot deep, one foot max, and we will be below that. But we suspect our garden, with a large pond and high fence, is less zone 6 and more toward the warmer middle of 5, granted we get snow cover before we get deep cold. Water lilies are ok here left in year round. But all ours do go quiet in winter, down to tiny ‘winter leaves.’
Supposedly you can pull out the roots in winter and keep them in a cool area that doesn’t freeze (still in water/mud, probably in a bucket in your garage would be fine), then replant them in the spring once the danger of freezing is past. Don’t know if that game is worth the candle. OTOH, the NA variety should be winter hardy in your area, but I’ve only heard of white and yellow ones. One of the professors at the community college where I worked previously would bring in lotuses and water lilies to the library for flower arrangements. They smelled heavenly.
One would think that your pond would trap heat, rather than be a heat sink (water is good at that). You already know it never freezes completely down, and your fishies are grateful for it.
OT: I’ve been enjoying Google Sky Map. It was released a couple of years ago, so I’m coming to it a bit late, but anyway it’s good.
You hold up your smart phone towards any part of the sky, and it shows you a map of the sky behind the phone – constellations, planets, International Space Station, Hubble telescope, etc.
I wish I had had that when I was about 12 years old and spending my evenings looking at the stars with binoculars.
There’s one for the iPad that I think is very beautiful; it’s called Sky Guide. It’s fairly large, because of the detailed images, so I’m not sure if it would be as good on an iPhone; and I haven’t yet found one for the Samsung phone that I like as much. I’ll give Google Sky Map a try on that.
I’ve seen that work. It’s pretty neat!
I’ve used it as well with my Droid X, especially when there is an interesting astronomical phenomenon occurring. I don’t have the Droid “Activated” right now and am using a “dumb” phone until I get bills caught up and can afford to pay for the data plan with the Droid again. I believe you use it with the internal GPS on the phone, but I think you can use it with Google locating your phone and plugging the proper coordinates into the application.
If you have a home router with wi-fi, then you don’t need a data plan. You can connect to the internet through your home network. Sky Drive doesn’t need to be online all the time, so once it’s downloaded you can just run it without an internet connection – or even without a SIM card in your phone!
Also, have you considered using a prepaid phone service? That often works out very much cheaper than a contract, if you are not using your phone very much. I think cell phone services in the US tend to be a lot more restrictive and expensive than they are in many other countries, but there are certainly prepaid services available. See this article about them, for example.
For me it makes sense to buy an unlocked phone outright and use prepaid. It’s very much cheaper in the long run. I don’t make many calls on my cell phone – just occasionally phoning or texting, so it doesn’t make sense for me to have a contract.
The Droid is connected to the wi-fi in my house, that’s how I used the Google Sky, I also use it for other things, without having to using Verizon for anything other than my regular “dumb” cell phone.
Planted a forget-me-not for May Day. Happy may, all!
Monday was a rainy day, but one of the ladies in my water exercise class at the YMCA brought in some rooted suckers from her lilac shrub. I planted it in the bed at the back corner of my house where another large unidentified shrub used to be. It’ll be surrounded by daylilies and hopefully, won’t crowd them out, either.
May Day is Lei Day here. Aloha!
Aloha, and forget-us-not! Happy May to all!
Of some interest to people living in Eastern Washington 😉 , Mt St. Helens is recharging.
We honestly look forward to a little ‘minor’ activity to rebuild the beautiful cone—not to blow sky high, of course.
I remember the apples that came out of Washington state after the disaster. I could just hold one of them in my hand. There was enough flesh on each one to make an entire meal!