Houston TX In-Ground Pond

[Rick Op]

Hi everyone. I have a concrete-over-liner-over-clay pond which came with the house, one 300-Gallon RubberMaid Stock Tank (RMST) filter/growbed, and several more in the works.
There is noooo turning back for me.
System was first planted out in early June 2010 and 24 Channel Catfish were added to the goldfish already resident in the pond.
Future plans include an indexing valve, more RMSTs of either 300-gallon or 100-gallon size, experiments with different drain styles and automation...
I have been using Expanded Shale for its porosity and local origin (well, Dallas is more local than Germany) and I think I will continue to use it, maybe sift to a larger pebble size like 3/8 inch to eliminate the clogging I started to see in the first GB.
Successful crops have been Okra even though I started it late, Basil, Aloe Vera, and Lettuce season is under way!
Plan to try citrus trees (both rooting cuttings and producing-size), salvias, Corn (next spring) and probably will do some legumes this winter along with broccoli and bok choi and other cabbage-family faves.

Suggestions are very welcome. I have a lot of room to expand...

Rick

[Chi Ma]

[Rick Op]

Chi Ma said:

 

Clever.

Hey, I'm blocked from seeing *any* of this site's pics until I get back on my home ISP. Where you'd normally see a picture, it's blank. I'll throw a few on.

[Rick Op]

This machine has less of my portfolio, but it isn't blocked from viewing pictures on the Ning...

It should post them OK...

The 300 Gallon 'starter'

 

The Pond

[Rick Op]

Yep, I'm blocked from the Picture-hosting part of Ning, but allowed to read and post on the text-hosting bits!

(If I subscribed to the "worthless without pics" philosophy, what would that say about the site's worth?)

 

Similarly, I can work within "Flickr" and "Snapfish" but not "Photobucket." Kinda arbitrary if you ask me.

 

I'm not gonna abandon my membership here because of it. IMHO there's still "worth" in the text descriptions. Your mileage may vary.

 

Rick

[Chi Ma]

I was just giving ya grief buddy :) Nice setup. I can see your pics. Looks like It will be quite a system.

Rick Op said:

Yep, I'm blocked from the Picture-hosting part of Ning, but allowed to read and post on the text-hosting bits!

(If I subscribed to the "worthless without pics" philosophy, what would that say about the site's worth?)

 

Similarly, I can work within "Flickr" and "Snapfish" but not "Photobucket." Kinda arbitrary if you ask me.

 

I'm not gonna abandon my membership here because of it. IMHO there's still "worth" in the text descriptions. Your mileage may vary.

 

Rick

[TCLynx]

I had some troubles early on with my firewall blocking lots of stuff on the ning site.  I had to go in and tell the firewall to allow me to use it (which of course meant I needed to get into my firewall software and I actually wound up getting new firewall software before it was all done.)