Pond Spring Clean

 Our pond has been looking a total mess for quite some time now and I found it too overwhelming to try and tackle the cleaning of it ourselves.
The last time, Anton cleaned it and that was about seven years ago I think.
So I went to the web and found Rob who specializes in pond cleaning.....
He arrived Monday morning at 9.30 am and looked at the pond and said something under his breath about the fact it seemed somewhat overgrown and dirty.....I had to agree of course and feeling very embarrassed offered him a coffee to ease my conscience somewhat ....

Rob changed into his waterproof gear which reminded me of our trout fishing days in the Snowy Mountains at lake Tantangara and Tom and Mollie Taylor's Currango homestead where we stayed in the autumn and caught amazing rainbow trout.....Rob hopped into the pond and started lifting the massive root systems the water lilies had established for themselves....did I perhaps have a saw he could use to cut the mass into more manageable sizes. In the top photo you can see the fake crocodile behind him and that was the first to get the chop....then all the green weed which , once it is established goes feral

After some heaving and tossing which took quite a while, the pond was ready to be pumped out.
This proved to be quite a difficult job as well as of course the Holm oak has been dropping acorns for years into the water and they sit on the bottom of the pond and block the filter of the sludge pump....
Meanwhile Rob was fishing out the Gold fish which, miracle of miracles, the White faced Heron had missed. There were also some fat tadpoles which was good to know as I thought the Gold fish ate all spawn and tadpoles which might have had a chance to metamorphose into frogs.

By about three in the afternoon the pond was down to only a little puddle and we could see headway. I thought to fill the pond up again with the rainwater from a tank we have and use mainly to water out summer garden. However, Rob says rainwater is too soft for Gold fish so we had to use mains water. Later though he said he had some stuff to harden the rain water so we were able to compromise and use half and half.
We had over an inch of rain out of this last weather system so the tanks were overflowing and it was good to use some of the water for the pond.

The pump we have in the pond and use to circulate the water through the fish fountain, turned out to be a septic tank pump and not a proper pool pump with filter.
Rob thought to bring one down for me and install it till we realized I would have to get into the pond to extract it to clean the filter....
That would have been fine in my young days but now I am the age group which has learned caution and carefulness and timidity and all those sad terms one despised when one was young.....
Ah, well, the fish pump will have to do and I will buy a swimming pool scoop net to get any debris out before it starts to rot and become sludge once more.....