{"id":89,"date":"2013-03-27T04:00:44","date_gmt":"2013-03-26T18:00:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/swimming-ponds.theownerbuildernetwork.co\/?p=89"},"modified":"2017-03-09T11:08:41","modified_gmt":"2017-03-09T01:08:41","slug":"snakes-and-ladders","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/theownerbuildernetwork.co\/project\/2013\/03\/27\/snakes-and-ladders\/","title":{"rendered":"Our Natural Swimming Pond Build: Snakes and Ladders"},"content":{"rendered":"

This is Part 3 of Rebecca’s project. If you missed the beginning, you’ll find it here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"The<\/a>
The Intended<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

Yes, this is kind of what I had in mind. Well sure… bigger and finished but I’m sure you get the idea.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"The<\/a>
The Actual<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

Read on, fellow travellers. \u00a0There\u00a0is<\/em> a sound logic behind all this. \u00a0Just ask my husband…<\/p>\n

The adventure continues –<\/strong>
\nSo, with three little kids involved, we’ve decided to build a natural swimming pond – primarily for them. \u00a0We’ve traipsed around the yard, being constantly asked “what are you doing” and “when can we swim”.<\/span><\/p>\n

With a fairly good idea of where we are going to locate our swimming pond, I embark on my next mission – how to line the pond.<\/p>\n

I do the research. \u00a0It’s simple and cost effective to use pond liner. \u00a0Pond liner allows you to dig a hole the shape, depth and size you want. \u00a0Perfect! \u00a0I have a beautiful vision in my head of a gradual sloped entry (like at the beach) into a swimming area of about 6m x 4m with a depth of 1.2m – Deep enough to swim in, but shallow enough that you can stand at any point in the water.<\/p>\n

Enter problem number one. \u00a0Hubby doesn’t like that it is black.<\/p>\n

No, he isn’t racist. \u00a0He’s worried about snakes!<\/p>\n

If you haven’t read the earlier posts, we live in rural\/regional Australia. \u00a0We have pretty much every form of wildlife on our doorstep. \u00a0Depending on the time of year, we warn our city dwelling friends and family about the ticks; or the leeches; or the snakes. \u00a0There are frogs, spiders, micro bats, flying foxes, goannas, lizards, birds (big and small), blue and yellow centipedes etc etc etc. \u00a0They are part of our life and we wouldn’t change it for the world.<\/p>\n

There are snakes. \u00a0Just ask our vet. \u00a0We have had three dogs requiring anti-venom and we lost one of our staffies on the way to the vet, from another snake bite. \u00a0Apparently staffies are notorious snake chasers and catchers. \u00a0And ours are obviously a bit slow when it comes to staying out of the way of the bitey end.<\/p>\n

So, we have a heated discussion about why I don’t believe snakes will be a problem. Yes – snakes will go in search of water, but why would they come to a swimming pond where there are dogs on guard for wriggling things, when they could just go to one of the dams, water courses or creeks. \u00a0Have we ever seen a live snake close to the house? No – only the dead ones the dogs drag back. \u00a0And so it goes until I give up, and return to the internet with a very open mind about what else we can use on a very limited budget.<\/p>\n

I know our soil is clay based, so I suggest to hubby that we just dig a hole and use a product for sealing leaking dams, to make the hole water tight. \u00a0Another foolish suggestion. \u00a0Round two of the snake debate ensues.<\/p>\n

Second hand concrete blocks? \u00a0Too expensive to transport.<\/p>\n

Old railway sleepers? \u00a0Can’t get enough of them to do the job. \u00a0Probably would have ended with another snake debate anyway.<\/p>\n

Second hand fibreglass pool? \u00a0Hubby is happy with the idea.<\/p>\n

So, trawling the internet begins in earnest. \u00a0Ebay, Gumtree, Trading Post – anywhere I think someone might list one. \u00a0If you want a second hand above ground pool there are thousands. \u00a0Fibreglass pools are few and far between. \u00a0Some people want you to pay to lift it out of their yard; other people will give it to you for free, if you can get it out. \u00a0Others are hundreds of kilometres away. \u00a0Weeks go by without any real hope.<\/p>\n

Then I see it! \u00a0Sitting on top of a sky scraper in Sydney is an above ground fibreglass pool. \u00a0The price is right. \u00a0I ring and leave a message. \u00a0Then I ring and leave another message. \u00a0Then I get hubby to ring. \u00a0It is a sad day. \u00a0There is an apology that they didn’t ring me back and they have just sold it to someone else.<\/p>\n

The upside to this though is that it spurs hubby into action. \u00a0He starts making calls, and then more calls, and more calls. \u00a0And we find it! \u00a0A factory second. \u00a0It is bigger than I wanted and has a deep end. \u00a0Same warranty as a new one, but the repair “may not” be the same colour as the rest of the pool. \u00a0Care factor for us – Zero. \u00a0Hubby can see the snakes in a blue pond. \u00a0He is happy! \u00a0The price is right (and includes delivery) and it will be here in a couple of weeks.<\/p>\n

I think I’m happy. \u00a0It isn’t what I planned but it will work and a bit of research lets me get my head around how to incorporate the pond and pool shell into what I want as the final design.<\/p>\n

Now we just need a hole…<\/p>\n

Have you embarked on this kind of project? Did you use a lining or rely on natural clay to retain your water? If you haven’t started yet (but plan to), what have you decided to use?<\/p>\n

Part 4: \u00a0 The (W)hole Disaster<\/a>…<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This is Part 3 of Rebecca’s project. If you missed the beginning, you’ll find it here.   Yes, this is kind of what I had in mind. Well sure… bigger and finished but I’m sure you get the idea.     Read on, fellow travellers. \u00a0There\u00a0is a sound logic behind all this. \u00a0Just ask my […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":8685,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"The making of a natural swimming pond.","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","_seopress_news_disabled":"","_seopress_video_disabled":"","_seopress_video":[],"_seopress_pro_schemas_manual":[],"_seopress_pro_rich_snippets_disable_all":"","_seopress_pro_rich_snippets_disable":[],"_seopress_pro_schemas":[],"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","sma_last_campaign_date":"","_mwseo_primary_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[467],"tags":[466,468,469],"class_list":["post-89","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-natural-swimming-pond","tag-natural-pool-natural-swimming-pond","tag-natural-swimming-pool","tag-swimming-pond"],"modified_by":"DW","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/theownerbuildernetwork.co\/project\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/89","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/theownerbuildernetwork.co\/project\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/theownerbuildernetwork.co\/project\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theownerbuildernetwork.co\/project\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theownerbuildernetwork.co\/project\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=89"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/theownerbuildernetwork.co\/project\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/89\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theownerbuildernetwork.co\/project\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8685"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/theownerbuildernetwork.co\/project\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=89"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theownerbuildernetwork.co\/project\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=89"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theownerbuildernetwork.co\/project\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=89"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}