Wednesday 9th April 2008.
Another sunny day, the morning was hot but turning a little cloudy in the afternoon. I've my fingers crossed for dry sunny weather all week as I need to get the first three ponds ready for spawning.
The birds are really enjoying their freedom, little flocks of Zebra finches can be seen flying around and it reminds me of our trips up the North West tip of Australia, as this is their natural habitat. Sadly one of the parent females died for some unapparent reason, yesterday she could be seen with her head under her wing and not taking any notice of her nest of chicks. I think the male has taken on a single parent role and can be seen popping in and out of the nest. It'll be hard work on his own!
When I built the farm, I noticed two small holes in the end of most mud pods. At the time I thought nothing of it, but as time has gone by these holes have given me trouble in some ponds. It took me a while to figure what the were and my initial thoughts were water voles, but they were very regular in their positioning. Anyway once the liners were fitted they were out of sight, but several years on something has to be done.
Some of the ponds hold water better than others and most of the water loss is from the back side of the ponds. Through the length of the ponds ran two 'land drains', these are clay pipes laid about two feet down, these were capped when the ponds were built. After a while of thinking the reason for these holes running in the other direction suddenly clicked, they were also for drainage, made with a 'mole plough', these are made by an attachment fitted on the back of a tractor and is basically a sharp vertical blade with a bomb shape on the bottom. This cuts into the ground around 15" deep, the soil closes back together as the blade passes and it leaves a drainage tube where the 'bomb' shape cuts.
As each year has passed, the water has started to leak through some of these mole plough drains so action has to be taken. Today Cassie and I dropped the end liner down on mud pond 12, 13 and 14 and hammered two foot lengths of 2"x 2" timber into these holes. It sounds easier than it was, the grass and soil had to be dug away from the timber liner fixings before we could access the liner, but this is a one time only job and it should stop the leakage.
This evening we went out for a farewell meal with Michael Cox of Koi Nations Magazine http://koinations.com/ , in the morning he will be heading back to the States.