Just an update.
We netted the pond with a good quality net. Strung a rope from the deck to the fence, creating a "ridge-line" of sorts to lay the net over to raise it above the surface of the water about 3 feet. (It kind of looks like a tent.) Secured it around the perimeter with stakes. Looked good in theory, and even aesthetically, but here is the problem.
I was concerned about all our maple leaves falling in. In reality, what happened is that the maple leaves didn't come anywhere near the pond. However, all the neighboring elm trees from three different neighbors dump leaves every time the wind blows, and it seems like all those find their way to my pond. AND the net allows a bulk of them through. The weave is not small enough to keep them out. So now I have a netted pond with many leaves floating on the surface . . . which we all know will eventually sink. And guess what I'll be doing next spring? And we did remove the net once to skim off the surface of the pond, and in the process found a poor, dead, dehydrated frog. Evidently he was trying to get in the water and could not get through, then must've got cold and just died on top of the net. I was afraid that might happen when shortly after putting the net on, I found several frogs trying desperately to get in.
I am tempted to just remove the net altogether, and at least then I could go out occasionally and scoop leaves off the surface (until it freezes over). I do not own a pond vac, and I tried the shop vac thing late in the summer to see how it would work. It did NOT work for me. Whether it's because the pond is too deep or my shop vac is too wimpy, I don't know. It just didn't have enough suction to do much, and then I had to frequently be emptying it. AND, water and electricity just do not mix. Had I accidentally pulled that shop vac into the pond, which did almost happen a couple times, I might have been toast. So now I am left wondering how I am going to get the pond bottom clean next spring. I hate the thought of stirring it all up using a manual leaf net, but that might be what I have to do. I certainly am NOT going to drain 3,000 gallons of water to clean the pond out and lose a lot of my good bacteria.
Ho hum . . . what to do. I'll just leave it for now and think on it some more. I guess there must be different types of netting that are finer and would keep more stuff out, but this one came highly recommended and is not an el cheapo net. Feel like I wasted my money though.
