April 8 - john took the small waterfall completely apart and found a hole in the liner about 12 inches in diameter, right at the bottom of the falls. There had been about 4000 pounds of rock on top of the liner for about 15 years. john was surprised that the waterfall hadn't developed a leak sooner. john is rebuilding the small waterfall differently than before. He used about 100 concrete blocks to build up a sub-surface for the new falls. He will use the old liner as underlayment for the new falls and add a new 45 mil liner on top of this. He will slope the new falls more than the old one and have small pools and a number of falls in it. He is getting river pebbles from Strugis Materials and using some of the Colorado Moss Rock from before. He will stick the back of rocks together using black expandable foam.

Also, john has drained the 30,000 gallon pond to clean it out after 7 - 10 years worth of leaves falling into it without any filtration. He is adding 3 skimmers to catch most of the leaves and is adding a FluidArt bubble bead filter system to help keep the water clear. He reconnected the three bottom drains to the pumps again. For the last several years, john has had to drop 2 inch hoses over the side to get clear-enough water to pump over the falls. While he is at it, john will probably have Bair Construction spray concrete over the big falls before john starts on a re-design of it.

zenpond looks really bad right now with all the work john is doing to it! joyce is asking when john will be finished with "the mess". At this time, the virtual zenpond looks much better than the real one. Mother Mallard usually brings her hatchlings around the first of May. john will probably not be ready for her and her family this year :-(

April 26 - john has been working hard on zenpond since the last entry into this journal. He took the small waterfall completely apart to find the leak in it. It turned out that there was a hole 12 inches in diameter right at the bottom of the falls. john now knows how to build a better waterfall: don't try to put 4000 pounds of rock on top of a liner and expect it to last very long. The rock was stacked vertically with the liner wrapped around behind it. Water would get behind the rock, travel down and find the large hole at the bottom. The new design has over 100 concrete blocks underneath the sloped liner and just a few pounds on the liner at any one spot. john knew that often expandable foam is used to keep the rocks in place and is waterproof. It's main use is to keep the water from going behind the rocks and directs the water where you want it to flow - on top of the rocks! john found out that you can get black expandable foam, which better hides the foam from view. The only problem is that the black version is $18 - $20 a can whereas the white is less than $5. john used about 12 cans on the small waterfall and then trimmed the expanded foam to hide it. This doesn't keep the foam from showing, so john remembered that Krylon makes a new paint that paints on plastic, "Fusion". john uses it to hide hoses, etc. What john discovered is that Krylon also has come out with a "camouflage" spray paint. It works great!The white foam just disappears!!! john isn't sure how safe it is for the fish, but is willing to find out. Also, he isn't sure about how well the paint will wear exposed to running water. john will post a picture of the new waterfall soon.

john and Eddie also moved 14 tons of 1/2 inch gravel from the front to the backyard. Eddie almost has all 14 tons added to the big waterfall by filling a five gallon bucket and carrying it to the top of the falls over and over. john plans to improve the size and look of the falls and will have the waterfall gunnited instead of using the rubber liner.

john and joyce came home last Saturday afternoon to see two heads sticking out of the creeping pholox near the little pond in the front yard. A further peek from the front window revealed a mother Mallard duck with 15 ducklings swimming in the 4 foot diameter pond. The ducklings were so cute! Just little fluffs! Since john was working on the other ponds, he was afraid she would try to raise her ducklings in this tiny pond. Later in the day, she had decided to move on to a bigger space somewhere, which left john and joyce both sad and glad.

About a week ago, john, joyce and their best friend jerry drove to Topeka, Kansas to see a private home that is open to the public that has 35,000 tullip bulbs planted over 3 1/2 acres. Here are several pictures from that trip. Note: none of the colors have been enhanced. When john asked where the owner buys his tullip bulbs, the answer was that the Dutch saleman comes to their house from Holland personally on his tour across the U.S.