I’ve been working on finishing up my back yard landscaping.   The aquaponics garden is going good.  Our chickens are laying everyday again and its  time to finish up this year long project.  My good friend Don has really helped out.   I am awful when it comes to design – no creativity.  Mechanically, I can build about anything, but I just have no artistic ability.

This weekend I had a lot to do.  I started off by going to the nursery and buying plants for the backyard.   Once I got the plants home, I shifted focus and spent the next few hours working on my truck – resealing the intake manifold because of a water leak.   By 3:00 in the afternoon, it was time to get back to the yard and get my plants in the ground.

In this small corner area just off of the aquaponics garden you can see Aloe Vera, Mint Saucer tucked under the far rock, some Yellow Iris by the rocks, Purple Lantana, and some Yellow Carolina Jasmine and Orange Honeysuckle against the walls.   I plan to add trellis’ later and have the Jasmine and Honeysuckle  cover the wall.   I also ran wiring for lighting — you can see the loops left behind two of the rocks.    In the center of the photo is my apricot tree.    Next to the  posts of the aquaponics garden I placed creeping fig which I will train up the post over time.

In the photo below, I added English Ivy to the corner of the chicken coop.  Over time, I will train this up the side of the coop.

One last Carolina Jasmine on the far end of the coop which will also get a trellis soon.

Soon the water in my aquaponics will have cycled and it will be time to add my fish.   I figure about that same time, I will finish my landscaping off with the crushed granite/DG to add the red crushed rock look to the ground and give it that clean finished look.