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Every couple of years, I refactor the little garden stream in my back yard. The previous version didn’t have enough water velocity in the lower half to generate the kind of visuals and cascading that I had wanted. But the nature of a project this is that by the time you actually get to run water through the thing, you’re basically done, and making baseline modifications amounts to tearing it all up and starting from scratch. So unless you have limitless free time you have to take your best shot and hope. Lesson learned from the last iteration then: you can only generate consistent water velocity by a consistent drop in the underlaying ground (and plastic shell). Trying to build the slope with rocks and such inside the shell doesn’t cut it. The water just happily re-routes around it, like electricity in a circuit or money in politics.

Anyway, here is this year’s version. It features nice velocity the whole way to the end, and a splashdown that is loud enough to hear consistently at night, in bed, even with the windows closed The foilage hasn’t started to grow in yet, but once it does the whole thing will be very nice to have in the background when he hang out in the courtyard with friends, build a little fire and have a drink.