Dividing The Pond

My pond has been pretty dry for the last few years, due to our long term drought here in Florida. Last winter, I decided to compartmentalize the dry pond bottom, by dividing it into small mini-ponds, each separated by a berm.

In the cool, low humidity of a Florida winter, it actually was a very pleasant task.
As is often the case, I meant to do more, but did not finish dividing the entire pond bottom.

My goals were :

1) Capture and hold rainwater, concentrating it in the mini-ponds, rather than allowing it to spread out and evaporate so quickly.

2) Provide some micro-habitat for my fellow amphibians.

3. Get a workout.

4. Create some mini-wetland troughs for my expanding wetland plant collection.

When Tropical Storm Debbie dumped so much water at once, I was a little disappointed when my compartments remained dry .
What was happening was a filling of the groundwater deficit from below and I was too impatient.

A few days after Debbie had moved on, the bottoms of my excavations became moist.

Since then, the daily deluges (well, almost daily) have added enough water to the mini-ponds to support some amphibian reproduction.

As you can see in the video, there's a big vegetation difference between winter and summer down there in the still, mostly empty pond.

I'll keep you posted on how this project turns out, but for now, it seems to be working as I planned.

I know ...

I am awestruck by that too.