Late winter is a pretty dull time in the garden, with the only real highlight being my miniature Cymbidium orchids blooming for the first time. I struggled with Cymbidiums in Mandurah (where I grew them under shade cloth along the western side of the house), and ended up binning or rehome them all except for two Golden Elf crosses with sentimental value. These two little battlers thrived under the hard plastic roof alongside the other miniatures I had picked up from Big W. Surprisingly, these plants are seemingly unaffected by voracious bush snails. After seeing how well the Cyms have coped, I have been inspired to expand my collection; and rearrange my growing area to better suit them.

When we moved to Joondalup, I had originally planned on focusing on Oncidium alliance hybrids; thinking they would grow happily outdoors in our Californian climate and be better suited to the available growing space at the southern end of the patio.

What I wasn’t prepared for was how badly these plants are impacted by bush snails. These minute molluscs had been slowing killing my collection one root tip at a time. I had initially placed the Oncidiums outside, planted in drilled Italian terracotta pots sitting in polystyrene vegetables boxes to maintain humidity. They were planted in a coconut husk and charcoal mix, which was perfectly fine for these plants, but they just failed to thrive or went into gradual decline. The issue was the tiny bush snails that had arrived from somewhere (probably straight from hell), and decimated their delicate roots. Conventional snail pellets don’t attract these pests, and espresso drenches did absolutely nothing to stop them. For a while I was going out nightly with tweezers and methylated spirits to kill them individually. But they breed like rats, and there were always new babies ready to attack the recovering root tips. The only way to vanquish these pests is to bare root your orchids, spray the roots thoroughly with a 3 % Hydrogen peroxide solution, pot them into a clean pot using sterile mix, and move them somewhere the snails can’t find them. (If you want to learn more about fighting these snails, check out Miss Orchid Girl’s videos on YouTube).

A few weeks ago I finally snapped, pulled all my Oncidium hybrids out of their clay pots, have them the peroxide treatment, potted them into transparent plastic pots and evacuated them into the house. I had already moved a couple of precious Oncidiums indoors after giving them this same treatment, and they have been thriving. An extra twenty orchids inside the house has been a bit of a continuous issue, but the matter has been resolved by rehoming some overgrown foliage plants, gifting some Phalaenopsis to a friend, and buying another set of plant shelves to sit them on.

The mix I use for these fine rooted orchids is a blend of coarse perlite, fine coconut husk chunks (I sieve and grade my own) and fine hardwood charcoal pieces. I’m not sure what ratios I use, I just add ingredients until it looks right to me.

After repotting, I sat the Oncidiums in a storage crate in front of the laundry door, where it is nice and bright and cool. After a few weeks, I noticed that some were starting to push out new roots, and so they were then shifted into their permanent positions on the stands in the “fish room”. Since moving them safely indoors, two have come into bloom, and I just found a fresh spike on my favorite Aliceara.

I always try an double-pot my indoor orchids, sitting the plastic pot on a layer of moist LECA inside a decorative ceramic pot. The LECA helps keep the humidity up around the plant, whilst preventing the roots from sitting in water and rotting. To water, I put them all in a plastic mesh basket and take them outside and soak thoroughly with a watering can. This way the foliage gets rinsed and the potting media is evenly saturated. At the moment I only need to water once a week, with dilute liquid fertiliser. In the summer months I will also have to water mid-week with plain water to keep them damp enough. Oncidiums do not like to dry out completely between watering.

After saving the Oncidiums, I cleared out the foam boxes, and swept and hosed down the pavers before reorganised my remaining plants. I have since purchased a few (read 10) new miniature Cymbidiums to fill up the space. I think this corner will be a nice little area in time; rather than the unsightly plant dumping ground it was previously.

After unsuccessfully trying to locate some coloured paradise fish locally, I decided to look online. Last Friday I found an online retailer with four unsexed albino paradise for sale. Even factoring in shipping costs, they weren’t badly priced, so I added them to the cart and placed my order. Unfortunately I stuffed up my details and gave the wrong email address, and didn’t receive any order confirmation. But when I contacted the customer care team, I was told that the order went through and the fish were shipped yesterday. I used the tracking number and was completely surprised to learn that they would arrive today! Thankfully Mark is working from home, so they didn’t have to sit on the doorstep all afternoon.

I had decided to place the new fish in my clay lily pot, which is currently housing two old male golden Medakas, some Java moss and a bunch of English water cress. This will act as a sort of quarantine tank just in case there are any problems.

I asked Mark to float the bags for me, so I could introduce them when I got home. Then, after a few hours acclimation, I cut the bags over a net in a bucket of pot water and released the fish. Then they were gently lifted up and introduced to their new watery home.

In almost no time at all they were exploring their surroundings and chasing the Medakas about. I added some mosquito larvae in case they were feeling peckish, and they happily started hunting around the moss for a snack. Tomorrow I will offer some dry food.

Today we visited the “Cymbidiums in lockdown” winter show with our friend Ash. I’m not a massive Cym fan, but I do have a few warmth-tolerant miniatures that I really like. I much prefer these to the big standard types because they take up less room and can be brought indoors easily when in bloom. I hadn’t planned on buying any orchids today, but still managed to walk away with three. I got one Cym, Cymbidium Cooper Point (a Golden Elf/erythrostylum cross) , and two miniature Vanda falcata hybrids. Miniature Vandas perform so well for me indoors, so I had to snap up these two new varieties; Fuchs Ocean Spray (yellow) and Hsingying Starlight (lilac).

After removing them from the bark mix, I just placed them into some empty glass tumblers. When they get bigger, they will go into a tried and tested gherkin jar.

After the orchid nursery, we swung past the Woodvale lily farm to pick up some spare aquatic planting mix. While I was there I also bought some clumps of an unidentified submerged aquatic plant growing in one of the ponds.

After some google searches, I have tentatively identified it as water thyme (Hydrilla verticillata), a native of northern Australia. I have just potted it into a plastic dish in the same way as my other aquatics and placed them on the floor of the pond. I need more weeds to provide refuge for my small fish, so this is a great addition.

You are probably wondering about the new blog title. Why the change? Fish? There has been a big change to the original plan for our garden, and I figure now that aquatic life is such a major part of it, the blog’s name should reflect that.

Since my last post back in late December, there has been a notable addition to the back yard. A pond. A serious pond. Approximately 7,500 litres. I have always loved aquatic plants and keeping small fish in planted water pots and ponds. In our old garden I had a number of water pots, including a large clay pot planted with water red lilies and home to a prolific family of speckled live-bearers (Phalloceros caudimaculatus), small glazed pots with paradise fish (Macropodus opercularis) and floating Amazon frogbit, as well as an old corner spa which I had buried, lined and converted into a pond for rosy barbs (Pethia conchonius) and white cloud mountain minnows (Tanichthys albonubes). When we sold the old house, the lily pot came along with us. While the pot itself was in storage, I kept the lilies and a few fish in plastic tubs at my parents house while we looked for a place to buy. When we moved in, the lily pot was the first thing to be reinstated. I thought I would be happy with just one miniature water garden, but a weekend trip to a nursery changed all that.

In mid-January we visited Waldeck’s Garden Centre and Blue Lotus Cafe in Stirling for afternoon tea with Mark’s uncle. The cafe has an outdoor deck partially suspended over a huge koi pond, decorated with overflowing water-bowls. It was so peaceful to sit out outside on a hot afternoon, listening to the trickling water and watching the fish go about their business. At some point the comment was made that we could put a pond in the back yard, and I wasn’t about to argue.

The most logical position was the large section of garden bed on the northern side of the house which was previously home to the raised garden beds. I figured that if we were going to have a pond, it needed to be a decent size so it could accommodate all the fish and lilies I aspired to keep. Even the biggest off-the shelf molded plastic ponds would be too small for this project. I also didn’t want to have to physically dig out and line a pond, mainly because of the cost of disposing of excavated soil, and the difficulties that would arise if we ever decided to fill it in. The most logical option was a raised pond. I had looked at some brick-built ponds on Pinterest, and thought we could construct one using natural limestone blocks to match the exiting retaining around the pool area.

In search of more inspiration, we visited the Woodvale Fish and Lily Farm. One of the gentlemen there, Steve was incredibly helpful, advising against brick or limestone (which could potentially crack and leak) and suggesting we opt for a flexible plastic pond liner supported by treated timber retaining walls. He advised that the retaining system can be purchased readily from Bunning’s, was simple to install, and you could even add a capping plank on top to make a seat. Sounded perfect to me. There are a number of similar retained ponds on display at the farm, and they looked ideal for our situation. After making that decision, we had a quick look around at the display gardens and ponds; although Steve strongly advised us not to get carried away until the pond was built! I loved the perfumed blues and purple tropical water lily varieties; which remind me of those that grow wild in far-north Queensland. But my favourite thing at the farm was seeing the shoals of “tropical” variegated platy fish (Xiphophorus variatus) darting amongst the weeds in the plant filter beds. Was this Perth or Port Douglas?

While we planned for the pond, I couldn’t contain my passion for water gardening, and set up some plastic “summer tubs” on the back patio. These were just some circular builders tubs filled with water to accommodate some leopard danios (Brachydanio rerio frankei) that I rescued from becoming feeder fish as well as some frogbit and Java fern plantlets from the aquarium. because of their small size, I added an air-driven sponge filter to each pond to keep the water clean and oxygenated. I also decided to move my remaining two gold medakas (Oryzias latipes) from the lily bowl and orange-fin danios (Brachydanio kyathit) from the aquarium into the tubs in hopes that they would breed. It didn’t happen. I think the medakas are both male, and I suspect that the skittish danios (despite the floating plants I provided) leapt to their deaths amongst the pot plants. Now that the lily pot was empty, I added a single male paradise fish from City Farmers to control any mosquito larvae. At the same time I also purchased a strange looking silver fish with a blue eye which was living alongside the mixed danios. I suspected it might be a native blue-eye (Pseudomugil sp.), and would be happy outdoors with the medakas.

The first stage of pond construction began on March 1, with me digging up the topsoil and levelling out the site of the future pond. I seriously underestimated how much soil needed to be moved, ultimately filling a full mini-skip. I was very glad we didn’t go with an in-ground option!

Then, well, COVID 19 happened. People went mad for toilet paper, pasta and rice, non-essential travel was off and the project got put on hold. I didn’t think the pond would happen this year at all, and that would we would be locked down for at least 12 months. Thankfully neither turned out to be the case.

One of the biggest impacts of the virus on our family was that Mark’s dad Ray, a FIFO worker, was unable to return home to Queensland. The silver lining was that he was available to help with the pond. And of course by “help” I mean literally do all the work himself; which I am still incredibly thankful for. It was a massive job, and I think it looks absolutely fantastic. There was some hesitation on his and Mark’s behalf about the size, and they thought maybe it was twice as big as it should be. I disagree.

At the end of April, we finally felt confident enough with how things were playing out with COVID to order the materials online and have them delivered to the house. While we had initially planned to use treated timber sleepers, we felt that termite-resistant jarrah would tie-in better with the colour of the external brick walls. The timber and supports was delivered via crane, and we stowed it in the garage until we could make a start. I didn’t expect Ray to get stuck in and basically finished at the first opportunity when he came down at the beginning of May, so I can’t really give much detail on how the build went. But I do know that he opted to concrete-in the corner and side supports to make it more stable. We were a little disappointed with the finish of some of the sleepers, but I guess it adds to the rustic charm.

The next thing we needed was the liner, which meant heading back to Woodvale. We purchased a 0.7mm liner cut to measure, as well as some underlay to protect the sides from any splinters in the sleepers. It was a bit of a surreal moment when Ray said it was tile to fill it up. After 4 or so hours, she was officially a pond. The last part of the build was the installation of the seating. This part didn’t go so smoothly, as some of the sleepers were too wide to accomodate the support brackets. Modifications were required. But in the end she looked magnificent. The doubters were still worried it was too big though.

I have never had a filter in any of my ponds before, relying on low stocking rates, aquatic plants, water changes and shade from surrounding plants to keep them clear and clean. But given the scale of this pond, a filter was necessary. Because of the volume of the pond, we were given two options. Either two smaller pressure filters, or one massive one. We went with the massive one, a Pondlink WIFI UV Pressure Filter 30000 with a PondMAX dirty water pump. I feel like this filter was also a way of getting gadget-happy Mark on side. It has WIFI control and is fully automated, meaning it cleans itself with a tap of the screen. You can even set it up to clean itself on a regular schedule. The future is now! This filter is also fitted with a UV steriliser to prevent algae or “green water” so the pond won’t look like a big trough of pea soup. I have to say though, my favourite feature is that it logs the temperature of the pond over the course of the day. It was very interesting to see just how cool the water gets on a cold morning. Already I have seen it down below 10 degrees Celsius, and winter has only just officially started! Perth is considered to have a mild, warm temperate climate and I know that a lot of fish that are regarded as tropical survive and thrive if kept outdoors in the Perth region. I guess the dips in temperature are tolerable provided that the water warms again during the day. I have since read a paper that found wild rosy barbs in floodplain lakes and wetlands in the Kashmir Valley, with water temperatures between 4 and 31 degrees Celsius! Definitely not too cold here.

The filter was installed alongside the pond, with the inflow and return pipes connected via holes cut through one of the sleepers. The waste outlet was connected to a drainage pipe which diverts the backwash to water our Hibiscus hedge (which has been cut back to let more light onto the surface of the pond). I really wanted a Balinese limestone “spitter” feature, and managed to find a couple of options on Facebook Marketplace. It was either going to be a family of frogs, or a pair of fantail goldfish. I put these to a family vote, and the goldfish won. Setting up a platform and connecting the the diverter to the spitter was a bit of a hassle. But Ray managed to engineer a pipe system connected to length of PVC conduit that meant the water would spout out of both the fishes mouths. We then adjusted the flow to achieve a the most gentle and soothing sound, with the rest of the filter back flow piped along the floor to maintain good circulation. We had initially set up the filter using an external extension cord, but luckily for me, one of my colleagues husband is an irrigation electrician, and we were able to get him out to install a new external power-point on the side of the pond to run the filter.

After getting the filter set up and letting the water age for a week, we were able to add a few fish and plants. The first residents were the leopard danios from the summer tub, as well as the elusive blue eye which I had not seen since I bought him. As soon as he was added to the pond, he immediately teamed up with the schooling danios. Obviously he is a social creature, so hopefully I can find him some conspecifics one day. In terms of plants, winter isn’t really the right time to buy as most are either dormant or unavailable. I did however buy some giant Vallisneria (Vallisneria americana) and curly pond west (Potamogeton crispus), which I potted into aquatic baskets using specialist aquatic planting soil and sunk to the bottom. It took no time at all for wetland insects to find the pond, and we had aquatic backswimmers and dragon flies hunting hovering midges almost right away.

After another week, we added some more fish. This time a small shoal of pond-raised platy fish. Unfortunately we had a few deaths from this batch, but the survivors settled in nicely. Now that there were some more visible creatures, Mark was also starting to take a keener interest in the pond. The reason for not adding all the fish I want right away is that the canister filters take time to mature or build up the bacterial colonies necessary to process fish wastes. The other reason is that the other species I want to add, namely golden barbs (Barbodes semifasciolatus), are not available pond raised. Adding fish that are accustomed to uniformly warm aquarium conditions to an unheated outdoor pond is not good for their health. So I will wait until late spring when the weather is warm. That way, they can adapt to cooler conditions gradually.

A lot of people asked me why we wearing adding koi and goldfish. The short answer is, I don’t like them. They are big, destructive, predatory and messy. I also wanted a tropical looking pond, which means choosing tropical fish. Small subtropical species are such better behaved, and I can have a lot more of them. There are a surprising number of conventional aquarium fish that do well outdoors in our climate, including platy fish, sword tails, several barbs and danios, Florida flagfish, paradise fish and White Cloud Mountain minnows. I was tempted to keep some Brazilian earth-eaters (Geophagus brasiliensis), but they, like goldfish, love to dig and so might not be conducive to aquatic gardening. There are also local native species which are ideal for ponds, specifically the colourful Western pygmy perch (Nanoperca vitiata). But I am a sucker for the exotic.

This past long weekend was the first weekend of unrestricted movement within the state, so we were able to catch up with our friend and fellow fish and gardening nut Ash. After coffee, we visited the Swan Valley Fish and Lily Farm. I didn’t really intend to see much available, but was surprised to see that all the tropical were still in full bloom after a week of miserably cold weather and the 2020 “Stormageddon” Mangga we had just experienced. My eye was drawn to a number of purple flowering tropical lilies in the sales pond, and I thought I may as well get them. I also picked up another five platy fish, while Ash grabbed an emersed Amazon sword (Echinodorus cordifolius) and a sarasa comet goldfish for his shady pond.

Once I got the new fish and lilies home, I added them to the pond. Our pond is slightly deeper than the ponds at the farm, so I placed some construction bricks on the floor of the pond to bring the leaves up to the water surface. Normally this isn’t necessary as water lilies are able to push out new leaves to reach the surface in a short amount of time. But as these tropical types are going into dormancy and need all the solar energy they can get, I didn’t want to risk them being drowned.

The pond is still not finished, we still need to spread blue metal around the base of the pond so we can walk around it safely and there are a lot more fish and aquatic plants I hope to add. Look out for more posts coming soon!

With all the rain on Saturday, I wasn’t in the mood to do much in the garden. I did however pick up some new and unusual submerged plants from an aquarium store to trial in the pond. The species is Blyxa japonica, and hailing from subtropical Japan, I am hoping it will be happy outdoors in the pond. I have just potted it in aquatic planting mix with a mulch of coarse river sand, and placed it on the edge of the pond where it will receive full sun. Hopefully it grows.

During the week I finally made a decision on what variety of hardy lily I wanted at the back of the pond. I wanted three hardy lilies to position along the back of the pond. This area is shaded in winter, but will receive full sun in summer, so hardy types should perform better than tropicals, which I will place along the front half. I really wanted a cultivar with flowers that are held above the water similar to the tropical types. After watching a lot of YouTube videos, I ruled out Colorado and Wanvisa, which seem overly vigorous, and settled on the more mannerly Red Spider. Red Spider is perhaps the most tropical looking hardy available here, with tall stems supporting red blooms with unique pointed, crumpled petals. I saw a picture of Red Spider alongside a purple tropical, and the combination is stunning. They also have attractive red spited foliage.

While the new lilies were only recently potted into mesh baskets, I wanted to start them off in big basins so that they have room to spread out. I added four lily fertiliser tabs to the base, placed a layer of soil on top, set the lily rhizome in place, added more soil and finally added a capping layer of river sand. The basins I used are just a 16L, 45cm diameter plastic wash basin, but they are perfect for hardy lilies.

For now I have placed them at the front of the pond in full sun. But as the sun moves overhead, I will shift them backward into their permanent positions.

Mark has done the math and with the addition of these three, I now have sixteen lilies in the pond. But as I told him, five are only miniatures, so they don’t count. I definitely still have room for some bright blue tropicals!

The same colleague who gifted me the dwarf lilies has also given me some disused floating aquatic planters. These are designed for growing bare-rooted marginal plants; with the theory that the roots will grow down and are suspended in the water column with the foliage spilling over the ring, forming a floating island of vegetation. These planters are ideal for cultivating edible aquatic herbs like mint, English and Lebanese water cress, and reportedly good for removing excess nutrients from the water. English cress is supposed to be the best aquatic for removing nutrients, as it grows actively over winter while most aquatic plants are dormant.

I had previously bought some English water cress from Coles and placed it in the pond, but it was struggling to stay afloat and wasn’t doing great. I got two new bunches of cress and added them all directly to the new baskets after rinsing them in clean water.

They have wilted slightly in the bright winter sunlight, but look to be recovering. I am hoping that the rings and foliage will provide potential nesting sites for the paradise fish, while the roots provide refuge for any fry.

Despite the perfect winter weather, I didn’t really get to spend much time outside this weekend. But fortunately I did manage to make a few additions to the pond.

During the week, a colleague who is getting out of water gardening very kindly offered me 5 dwarf hardy water lilies. These were planted in plastic mesh orchid baskets which are not really appropriate, so I bought a number of small black plastic wash basins to plant them into. After washing the old soil and pebbles off the rhizomes, I filled the dishes with sieved aquatic planting mix and added some fertiliser tablets. I then laid the lilies on top and topped the dishes off with propagating sand. The lilies are positioned right at the edge of the dishes so that they have the maximum amount of room to grow horizontally along the top of the soil.

After binging a lot of YouTube videos, I learned that pebble or gravel mulch impedes the development of the lily rhizome; which naturally grows horizontally along the surface of the soil. The placement of pebbles (chiefly to stop fine particles clouding the pond when positioning the lilies and protect the planting soil from disturbance by digging goldfish) reportedly restricts this natural growth habit and retards root development. Coarse propagating or river sand serves the same purpose of holding the fine, silty media in place whilst still allowing the lilies to develop normally. While sand is no impediment to grubby koi or goldfish, I don’t have to worry because none of my chosen subtropical fish are diggers. I also learned that hardy lilies, which grow from spreading rhizomes, should always be planted so that they have the maximum amount of space to develop. Whereas tuberous tropical species should be planted squarely in the centre of the pot. It makes perfect sense when you consider their respective growth habits. It’s exactly the same principle as when potting sympodial vs. monopodial orchids.

Two of the lilies were so tiny that I couldn’t justify planting them in dishes, so they were planted in the square reservoir pots that the water grass I bought last weekend came in. If and when they get bigger, they will go into a basin of their own.

As I now had enough planting mix, I potted on my remaining Gloriosa lily. Even though this is a hardy variety, because these plants have produced a number of new growth points I planted them in the centre of the dish so that each new lead has room to develop.

When we picked up the planting mix, I also bought some more curly pond weed and a pair of Amazon sword plants (Echinodorus cordifolius syn. E. radicans). I potted the pond weed in the same manner as the lilies. The fish seem to aggregate around the existing pot of weeds at the western end of the pond because it provides a nice, dense refuge. I am hoping that by adding more they will feel confident exploring the entire length of the pond.

The sword plants had been grown emersed sitting in shallow water, so I opted to pot them into black plastic buckets. I will leave these out of the pond until the weather warms and they recommence active growth. Then I will sink them into the pond to grow as emergents. Next to the swords are the water grass runners I salvaged from the overgrown Bunnings floaters. I hope these will develop into green carpets, then I can place them on the floor of the pond.

The paradise fish seem to be happy with their new home. To make them feel more secure I added some old coconut shells for them to hide in because there isn’t as much overhead cover as they like.

The minnows, danios and platies are doing well too. By adding more submerged plants I am hoping that they will feel more secure until the lilies start putting up floating pads in spring. I have also been giving them a little bit of food every morning to bring them out and get used to my presence.

I think I jinxed myself with my last post, bragging about our good weather. This week has just been rain and storms, with more to come. Given the poor outlook for weekend gardening, I took a long hard look at my water gardens and decided to make some changes. The other big event this week was the purchase of gravel to finish the pond. The gravel arrived on Friday, and Ray installed it before I got home from work. The finished pond looks fantastic, and I no longer have to worry about tracking sand around on my shoes. The 10cm layer of gravel was laid over a layer of weed mat do if we ever have to take it up, it won’t be as big a hassle as last time.

I have had my big, clay lily pot for around ten years now, and it has seen a few changes in its life. In Mandurah it was positioned beneath the clothesline, in one of the sunniest spots in the garden. It was planted with a single Nymphaea Chromatella, and was home to numerous fish species over the years; including rosy barbs, Buenos Aires tetras, Florida flag fish and finally spotted livebearers. It was always clean and clear, receiving regular top ups with the hose to flush out the leaves and gunk, and a full clean-out when the lily needed repotting.

After relocating to Joondalup, it was initially placed on the pavers in a sunny spot and planted with Gloriosa lilies, a blue Louisiana iris and some amazon sword plants. It looked ok initially, but despite the shade cast by the nearby cocos palm, I think it was getting too much hot summer sun. The plants looked yellow and failed to thrive, and I was getting a lot of string algae blooms. The gold medakas it was home to were happy though, producing fry here and there. The pot also became the favourite watering hole for a local pair of spotted doves.

Having had enough of the scruffy looking emergent plants, I decided to strip the pot down, move it to a shadier position and plant solely with the freshly divided and repotted lilies. This seemed to work well for a time, and the lilies flowered better than I had ever seen them.

I was pretty happy with the pot, but it never really stayed as clean and clear as it did in Mandurah. I suspect the issue was still excessive light, coupled with the constant input of leaves from the neighbours trees. Recently I tried to improve the conditions for the new resident paradise fish by adding a layer of zeolite gravel to the base and performing more regular water changes. But it still didn’t stay clear.

After seeing how well my parents fish pot was doing beneath their covered patio with very little care, I decided to give up on the lilies and shift the pot under cover. The most logical spot for the pot was the corner of the patio where I keep my Anthuriums and Heliconias, and had recently set up my plastic summer tubs.

After netting the paradise fish by torchlight and relocating them into the pond, I drained the water and lifted out the lilies and submerged plants; leaving behind a stinking layer of black ooze. I baled the muck out and used it to water my Hibiscus hedge, then scooped out the zeolite (I’m not 100% sure what I’m going to do with this now, perhaps I’ll blend it into future aquatic planting mixes).The lilies were placed in a plastic tub filled with water and set aside for repotting. The Vallis and pond weed were transferred to the pond along with the fish.

After clearing a space and sweeping up the accumulated leaves, I got Mark to help me carry the pot to it’s new position. I filled the pot from the hose, added water conditioner and left it to settle overnight.

The next day I cleaned the matured sponge filters from the tubs and added them to the pot along with the fish, Java moss and Java fern. After repositioning the potted plants, the job was done.

The plan with this pot is to let it become overgrown with Java moss, and add a small group of Honey gourami when the weather warms up. I have kept these in planted pots before, and they are one of the most beautiful fish for small potted water gardens. The doves soon found the newly relocated pot, so they won’t be going thirsty in summer.

Sunday’s job was to repot the water lilies and add them to the pond. Unfortunately I only had enough aquatic soil to plant three of the four (the last one will have to stay in the tub until then). It was too wet to take photos of the repotting process, but I basically took them out of the old aquatic baskets (which aren’t ideal for water lilies as it turns out) and potted them into black plastic wash basins using aquatic planting mix and a layer of river sand. I didn’t have any lily tablets, so I bought some osmocote aquatic plant prills and added four to each pot. The paradise fish will soon have more refuge, and I should have lots of red, anise scented lily blooms come spring.

I also picked up some discounted water grass from Bunnings. They were quite overgrown, but they should come good when I am able to divide and pot them up, and submerge them in the pond.