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biggerdiggler

Just one little pond, she whispered......only one......

BiggerDiggler
11 years ago

I am posting the following as a warning, a cautionary tale of the depths of depravity that this here innocent-sounding Rock Garden/Pond business can lead. I hope that by recounting my miserable story, others will avoid the same sad and terrible fate.

I have 6/10 of an acre. When we moved here, there was not a raised bed in sight. Now only a few square feet of lawn remain. There are now two smaller finished ponds surrounded with rock gardens, and we are now working on the "Mother of All Ponds" in the back yard. It is 60 feet long, 35 feet wide by 10 feet deep. It will have two gigantic waterfalls plunging into each end, roaring down the 30 foot "mountain" behind it. They are fed with two gigantic 9000 gph pumps. The excavator removed the dirt and built the 30 foot mountain behind the pond, and brought in two dump trucks full of large boulders to surround the pond. Nothing wrong with this part. This is all within the normal range of human behavior. My description of the despair and degradation is contained within the following paragraphs.

We have also brought in 70 trailer loads of granite boulders with a tandem axle car trailer, which now suffers from a bent axle housing. We loaded them all by hand with a Harbor Freight 700 hundred pound capacity handcart (we have brought back 3 absolutely-mangled ones for replacement, and now have "rebuilt" one entirely for rock hauling. On a handcart that cost brand new $45 we have spent around $150 installing heavier duty wheels, tires and axles, as well as having the frame beefed up by a custom metal fabricator) and a heavy duty wheelbarrow that is on its way to the fabricator to be similarly beefed up. That will turn a $20 Craigslist buy into a $200 or so heavy duty one.

We have built around 20 raised beds with granite boulders that covers most of the property that is not covered with ponds. We blew the rear-end out of a Ford F-150 3 or 4 times overloading the trailer with boulders, and now have TWO (TWO!!!!) Heavy Duty 3/4 4x4 trucks to pull the trailer. One has a big block chevy 454 and the other a Ford 460. They are ravenously hungry for gasoline. They are both getting airbags for the rear axles, helper springs, anti-sway hitches. We are now installing heavy duty disk brakes on all four wheels of the trailer, as well as installing heavier duty axles and and axle housings. We have destroyed 4 high-lift ranch jacks, four floor jacks, and at least 6 hydraulic bottle jacks raising up gigantic boulders to mortar them into place. We have blown up 6 brand new tires on the trailer in two years.

Two weekends ago, we found a farmer with manure to spare and rented two gigantic dump bed trailers and hauled 75 yards of composted manure. After reading Ruth Stout's books, we have hauled in two tons of hay and are planning on hauling in 140 bails this weekend (4 tons). We bought 200 knockout roses two weeks ago, now our property rose total is around 750. We have hauled around 125 yards of compost in the last two years for the roses.

They have been rebuilding the north/south highway about 10 miles from here and have unearthed thousands of gorgeous speckled-granite boulders. We have hauled about 20 trailer loads out since June. We spend our summer weekends in hot, filthy locales, sweating like swine loading 500 pound boulders to exhaustion, and then placing them around the property with the handcart.

I feel like my story may be helpful to others in avoiding the same fate. If you see yourself heading in the same direction, please I beg of you, stop yourself now. There is help out there.

Comments (10)

  • annedickinson
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    LOL OMG I am laughing myself silly. I have to send this to my BF who thinks my 160 gal pond (I have carried all the rocks myself) is way too much. A birdbath is more his speed!!

    Where's the pictures? I sure want to see this. It sounds fantastic.

    Thanks for a great laugh to start off the holiday weekend.

  • BiggerDiggler
    Original Author
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    I am glad I provided some humor for you.

    Just this morning, we unloaded about 5 ton of granite boulders and placed them on our "mountain." Now that the handcart is beefed up, it makes moving these boulders a lot easier than you would think. We had to build a trail (that we were going to build anyway, btw) ahead of time just in order to be able to move the boulders into place. We also had to put boulders into place just to keep the 50 or so Knockout roses from floating down the mountain.

    Those pumps are scary looking. I am guessing that each one of those babies is going to use $50 a month in electricity. 9000 gph and they can push the water 60 feet vertically. I blew the rear end out of the Ford F-150 the last go around driving 300 miles to get concrete pond molds. Each waterfall will have a series of drops with 3 small ponds. We will be building them inside the garage this winter.

    With all of the excavation and ponds and mountains and gigantic boulders, our formerly "huge" place is getting to feel smaller and smaller. We will eventually stop when we run out of room. I have been eyeing the vacant lot across the street and wondering if the county would let me "connect" my property to it with some sort of wooden pedestrian bridge across the street.

  • ademink
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Can't wait to see pics of all of this!

  • chas045
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Very impressive. There is a 'gardening with stone' site here that might appreciate your installations. Unfortunately it isn't well attended. Perhaps your post would wake them up over there.

  • Calamity_J
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    WOW!!! Can You plz open up a Husband School...I'd sent my hubby to it...I obsess about projects like yours and hubby just isn't the pack mule I would love him to be!lol! So ya, Don't make us beg for the pics please!!!!

  • gilroybighouse
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Ah, thanks! Makes my little pond renovation seem very modest and reasonable. I also have rebuilt the $45 hand truck after it collapsed from moving a Gingo tree, and it has been good for a few tons of rock moves since, though I think we are approaching rebuild #2 rapidly...

    Your rose count also makes me feel better about mine. : ) post some pictures, I'd love to see this!

  • granyhuskr
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    OHG this is sooo funny. As long as you can still post it and laugh about your experience then you are still sane. I will never complain about my little, 3500 green water pond again. HAHAHA

  • hosenemesis
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Hahahhha! Love it! This is a lifetime achievement. I can't wait to see.
    Renee

  • buyorsell888
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    At the height of my obsession I had over a dozen ponds and water gardens on my small city lot. The raccoons have become such a problem that I have cut way back....now I have seven or eight.....

  • tropicofcancer (6b SW-PA)
    11 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    All I can say is Wow. However, I have to admit that in out small urban house that had only lawn we slowly ended up doing same in a much smaller scale. Slowly is the keyword. It took us first 3 years to reclaim all the lawn and the next 8 years to transform it with a pond, raised beds, rain barrels, stone patio, trellis, stones, and what not. It is still on going process.

    But I just liked the way you described it. Beware all.

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