Australia may be the second driest continent on Earth, but it is still pimpled with various marshes, swamps, bogs and wetlands. I have tried to recreate our native swamps in one corner of our garden.
As of March 1999 the swamp underwent a significant redesign. It now boasts a creek and a stretch of sand loving shrubs.
We built a dam out of clay excavated from other places arround the garden and placed a large black plastic sheet down over the impression made. We covered the black plastic with a layer of peaty soil(from the garden supplier) and then covered that with about 30cm of mulch. The ground was kept damp by various means, including redirecting the rinse water from our washing machine.
Next, David and I looked around for plants which, although generally grown in ordinary ground, were suitable for growing in the harsh conditions of a swamp. Dichondra, Bullrushes, reeds, small native grasses and moss were planted around the centre which was to become the 'bog'. A dynamically generated list of species found.
The nearly continuous damp in the swamp allows many microbes and insects to florish and consume organic matter at a great rate. Because of this, we keep putting old and rotten pieces of wood around the swamp to keep the rate of decomposition steady.
Currently we have about 15cm of peat over the sandy base. This is growing at about 4 cm annually. Already several other plants have sprouted in the boggiest part:more reeds, some small grasses(called tinkerbells by many people) and Nile-River grass- which was removed due to it's invasive growth.
David and I have constructed a Board walk over the top, consisting of various lengths of Redwood suspended on logs actually in the swamp:these will have to move as the supports rot away. In march 1999 David and I rebuilt the bridge after a serious fall from ajh, the path is now bolted together; having bricks as supports.
The creek needs a largish sump of water to allow the creek to fill up without the pump running dry. This is provided by a fibreglass pool with an auto refiller system designed by ajh. That refill system was replaced in 1999 by njh with a solid state system which uses a computer to estimate the rate of evapouration by measuring the amount of water required to refill the pond at regular interval. I have more on the waterlevel system in my electronics section.
Insects I have seen include some rare wasps, mosquitoes(!), slater bugs, midges (not the sort that bite), gnats, small dragonflies, european wasps and a lizard. Mosquitoes aren't the problem they are in other places, because the water isn't really suitable for their breeding, as it is too fast moving, and contains numerous predators. However, the 'parent' mozzies still think they're in with a chance.
Flat worms(nematodes) like to live in the top end of the creek. Small red worms live in the water eating something(people?).
The swamp attracts a huge number of species of birds, including spotted pardalote, eastern spinebill and currawongs. Blackbirds are a nussance, with their habbit of rearranging the top layer looking for small insects.
There hasn't been any smell as of yet, probably because only wood is rotting, not vegetables or fruits(which tend to 'honk' a tad). Paul H.'s description was that it smelt, 'earthy'. After a year of decay, it still is odourless, perhaps because of the cleansing nature of peat
Below is a diagram of the actual construction showing the various layers involved.
Before we left for our holidays in Adelaide(christmas, 1997), david took a photo.
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