STOCK PONDS ALMOST READY

We chose to add EM [ Effective Microorganisms] to help with water quality. It took a lot of mixing and some patience for the mixture to cure but its now in the water and hopefully doing its job .

We also added elephant dung to the bed of the ponds to help initiate plankton growth. I actually checked the commodities market to see if Elephant dung was a new addition as trying to buy this "shit" was next to impossible. After 8 phone calls and 3 meetings.... I AM NOT KIDDING!!!!! We finally negotiated 300baht per pick up truck load and I had the pleasant job of starting every morning for a week loading my truck with Elephant crap:(...

The 3000sq meters of grass was not only for looks but also to stop the banks around the stock pond area from eroding during the coming rains.Luckily it has rained every day as that's a lot of new grass to water.

The ponds are almost full and we are now testing the water for PH levels ,Nitrates and Alkalinity. We unfortunately still don't have electricity to the resort due to some hold ups with the local electric authority which we hope will be resolved this week.

In the meantime we are working to run power to our ponds for the filters [ still building] and aerators..

LANDSCAPING STOCK POND AREA

We have landscaped the stock pond area . 3000 square meters of grass, 30 cocktail palms, 30 fan palms , a few flowering bushes and things are starting to take shape.

We hired 15 of the local villagers to help with the landscaping. Even with so many hands it was still a lot of work.

HOME SWEET HOME :)

We now have somewhere to live while working on the property . Our 12m x 3m prefab office/house was delivered this week along with a 40foot shipping container which has been modified to be our workshop as well as much needed storage space.

I was a little concerned about the road conditions for the trucks delivering the units . My worries were for naught as the truck completely missed the road and we had to dig it out with the excavator

The unit was built by SAFEWAY ASIA who manufacture and also rent prefab office units and containers in Thailand. I worked with Gord the owner on a simple design for a 2 bedroom unit and they had it finished in just 4 weeks.

Dont worry the unit isn' really going to land on Gord's head ..Rest assured those Thai lifting straps are to specification:).

It will be great to have running water , and as soon as we get electricity a hot shower . It will also be a lot easier to work as we will have a place out of the rain and blazing sun to review plans and solve problems as they arise. We have a temporary bamboo house for Boom's brother who is the lead Thai worker on our project. We also bought some bamboo salas which will be set up in different areas of the property and one will serve as shelter for our 24 hour security guard

4 PONDS FINISHED DIGGING

We now have 4 stock ponds finished and will be filling them in the coming week. We will then work on the water quality to make sure it is perfect before adding our current fish inventory. I am very excited to see how much all of our fish have grown and get some pics of the 50kg plus Arapaimas which Stuart Gillham has been growing for us. If the weather cooperates we will also finish the final 3 ponds in the next 2 weeks.