Creating a Lake

[jinman]

Well that shorebird is not a killdeer. It's a little blurry but it could be a lesser yellowlegs or a greater yellowlegs. It's hard to tell from that picture. Both birds are identical in plumage, their calls and size are different.

On closer examination of Eddie's picture, I think you are right Blake. The bird's beek is much longer than a Killdeer and it's a bigger bird overall. Also, what I thought were marks across the side of it's neck are actually not.

 

[EddieWalker]

Thank you everyone for your help in identifying that bird. It really had us puzzled, and one thing about Steph, is she loves a puzzle. We went down to the lake several times over the weekend to see it again and get some better pictures. She finally got close enough for some pics, but had to do them off hand as the tripod wouldn't set up and allow her to take the shots. It's a touch blurry, but still clear enough to see the spots on it's chest.

Yellowish beak and legs with spots on it's chest makes it a Spotted Sandpiper to us. We're open to suggestions and corrections, but that beak color is the main thing that we couldn't find in any of the other birds we looked at.

Eddie

 

[EddieWalker]

I have a question(s). Will your water always look brown? Can you one day look forward to clear blue water? Will the shorelines that eventually turn green help this process along? If you don't mind, please explain the process of "greening" your shore and "clearing" the water of your lake for those (like me) that are thinking about doing this one day.

Pat's answer covered allot of what I'm gonna say, so I'll try not to repeat it too much. But the fact that he has multiple ponds all in a row, and some clear up and others stay muddy is really the heart of it. There is just no way to know for sure what will happen.

I have a small 3/4 acre pond that I dug about 4 years ago. When full, it's 5 feet deep with a few areas that are 8 feet deep. It's very muddy, and much darker then this one. While building my house a year and a half ago, I through all my sheetrock scraps into that pond. I had read that one of the reasons for ponds remaining muddy looking is a positive, or negative, charge to the water. I can never remember which it is.

The gypsum in sheetrock nutralizes this electrical charge to the water and releases the suspended particles that cause the water to be brown and muddy looking.

After about a week of tossing those sheetrock scraps in the pond, it cleared up dramaticaly!!!!! The difference was HUGE!!!!! We were very exited about the results and looked forward to nice clear water. Then about a week later, the alge developed. It went from a few green patches, to almost total coverage of a green scum that grew on top of the water like a nasty puss. It was AWEFUL!!!!!!! It also lasted until the winter freeze killed it off. Then the rains arrived and filled the pond back up with muddy colored water.

Now that I've seen both options, I much prefer muddy colored water.

The water in the lake is much clearer then my pond. I'm sort of thinking that in time, it will get better. Especially when I get all the exposed dirt in my watershed planted in grass. This will increase my watershed, and should give me cleaner water.

My efforts to green up the shoreline and all of the exposed dirt consists of planting Sahara type Bermuda Grass. Sahara is drought tollerant and fairly aggreaisive. It's not a great haying grass, or pasture grass, but that's not my goal. I want to cover the dirt, have something that will naturalize and not require any watering. It's coming in slowly now, and in time, should be very nice.

Along the waters edge, I planted centipede grass. It's super expensive and extremly slow to develop, so it's gonna be awhile to see how that turns out. My goal is to have grass right to the waters edge like you see at a golf course. I don't want to mow right to the edge, so I'm hoping the Centipede will take hold there. Without any watering, it's depended on the moisture in the soil from the water in the lake.

Eddie

 

[EddieWalker]

Your mystery frog appears to be a young bullfrog.

The frog you labeled as a leopard frog appears to be a spring peeper. If it has an "X" on its back, it's definitely a spring peeper.

The plant appears to be an iris, but as someone already pointed out, the proof is in the bloom.

Hi Bob,

You could be right about the bullfrog. I was looking at some pictures at Wikipea that shows a young female bullfrog that is very similar to what we have. Closer then anything else I've seen.

I think you might be right on the Spring Peeper. I've never heard of it before, but it also looks like a very good match to what we have on the walls of our home. I'll have to look at the next one we see for the "X" on it's back.

Thank you,
Eddie

 

[coopers]

Eddie, that looks like a totally separate bird. I think you have a couple visitors. The spotted sandpipers have a nice little dance they do when walking or standing still, their bottom dips down and up. Pretty funny to watch; was the last bird doing that because it still looks like to me the last pictures were yellowlegs? Both yellowlegs and spotted sandpipers winter in your area.

Blake

 

[EddieWalker]

Blake,

The problem with the yellowlegs is the color of there beaks. Both pictures have a bird with a yellowish beak that is dark to blackish at the tip. The Yellowlegs has a solid, dark colored beak.

One thing that Steph mentioned is that the first picture was more of a winter color and the new pictures are starting to change to summer colors. I'm not sure about this as it seems kind of sudden to be changing plumage.

It would be very nice if we had two types of shorebirds. We really want as many species of birds as possible for the simple reason that Bird Watchers love to travel to places to see birds. The more we can prove that we have here, the more likely that people into birds will want to pay us to stay here.

Thanks,
Eddie

 

[UpstateNYMarine]

Eddie,

Now I like birds as much as the next guy...but I couldn't see myself planning my vacations where the birds are...haha. Just kidding. The lake is looking great and I can't wait to have one of my own (much smaller scale of course). I did find out that the ag folks in my county will help plan and help cover a good portion of the costs associated with constructing a pond.

Semper Fi...

 

[coopers]

Eddie,

I think you might be right now that I look at it more. It does have a different colored beak than I thought, it shows in the picture the winter plumage has a dark beak but since the beak seems lighter in those pictures, it was probably in the process of changing into its breeding plumage. It could your spotted sandpiper with winter plumage. It doesn't take too long to change out plumage so that could be your same bird.

Blake
WA

 

[EddieWalker]

Saturday morning, Steph and I went for one of our regular walks around the lake. It's one of our favorite things to do. She brings her camer and the binoculars, and I just wonder around daydreaming of what I can do next, or what it will look like in the future.

Along the shoreline, something moved that we were not expecting. At first, it didn't make sense what it was, but by the time it got to the water, she was able to get a few pictures.

One more example of the lake coming alive!!!!

Eddie

 

[EddieWalker]

Then during the heat of the day, I decided to do some mowing around the dam and shoreline. It went pretty good and I was having fun. I even started backing up to the waters edge on the peninsula to get rid of some of last years weeds and control this years crop.

The first picture shows what happens when you find a soft spot. You can't tell from the picture, but the rear tire is bottomed out and the mower deck is what's holding the tractor up. One of the front tires is about six inches off the ground, and I'm stuck.

Second picture shows the backhoe in position to pull me out. It's really pretty simple to do, but still annoying to have to deal with it.

Third picture is after it pulled the little tractor out.

Steph was sitting under a shade tree with her camera taking pictures of birds. I didn't know she took these of me, but since she did, I thought I'd share them with you.

At least it's tractor related!!

Eddie