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Here is Milton at feeding time. I give the goldfish some "goldfish flakes" from Wal Mart. They seem to like these. I sprinkle them in one area of the pond. So far they do not come when they see me; instead they hide and once they see the food floating around and I step back, they start munching.

My vegetable garden is far away from the pond. Although I do also have sunflowers and cucumbers growing around the pond, the tomatoes are in the vegetable garden. This is the first time I have had a vegetable garden.

I grew them from shootings that my grandma cultivated from seed, and I have to say I am not getting as many tomatoes as I would have if I bought them in the store in spring. This is pretty much my only tomato right now and it is already August. I have about 6 plants and expect a yield of 3 or 4 per plant maximum.

I made a delicious salad with a tomato, a cucumber, and some basil from my garden. I topped it with grated parmesan cheese, olive oil, and balsamic vinegar, with some pepper. I am waiting for another tomato and cucumber to ripen so I can repeat!

I bought some pond plants from eBay (they shipped in a plain envelope surrounded by wet paper towels with padding!) in early June because I couldn't find anything but lillies at the local stores here. Some have been doing great, and some not! I love the water hyancyth and the lettuce, pictured left. They have expanded to about 5 times their size in the two months.

The water poppy and the red ludwiga, on the other hand, have not fared so well. The ludwiga is slightly larger than when I got it, and the poppy keeps having yellow leaves and is not really growing, it has increased only slightly in size.

I know that the former are "floaters" and the latter were planted in soil, could this be the problem? Or, are the hyancith and water lettuce just more hardy? I placed a few on my hyancith into my bio-filter planter and they have grown UPWARDS, looking very healthy. These are even the most healthy of my hyancith right now.

In general, I am happy with all of my plants. I am hoping to overwinter them, but if they do not survive, I will be buying more of the hyancith and water lettuce for next year. They float over the top of my mechanical filter and cover it completely for a more organic look. I spent about $30 for all my pond plants, not including the lillies. I got 3 each of hyancith and water lettuce, another 3 ludwiga and 3 poppy. ALL the ludwiga and poppy are pictured here, while you only are seeing 1/2 of my hyancith/water lettuce collection.