Handmade Pond Skimmer

You don’t have to be an environmentalist to recycle/repair/repurpose things. Not being wasteful is just smart.

I needed a small net to skim leaves off of my small bog pond. And being the frugal, recycling, do-it-myself fan that I am, I came up with a way to make my own. And it’s made using materials on hand, so I didn’t have spend the money on a new product or use the gas to go find it. And for this particular item – handmade was fine.

	Materials: Wire clothes hanger or lighter gauge wire, gauze, netting or a pair of pantyhose, needle, thread or embroidery thread and some sort of handle – use a chopstick, old paint brush handle, or something like that. And a smooth glass or jar to use as a form for the wire ring.
	1. Cut a length of wire. Enough to wrap around your form and extra that will wrap around your handle to secure them together. Wrap around the form. With pliers, grab firmly the wire and twist together until the wire is tight against the form. Give it 3 or 4 good twists.
	2. Slide it off of the form – this is why we don’t use something that may have a lip or edge to it.
	3. Wrap the short end around the tip of your handle. Be careful not to disturb your perfect circle.
	4. With one hand firmly hold the handle with pliers. With the other hand start wrapping the long end of the wire down the handle. I ended up using a second pair of pliers and twisted my hands opposite of each other to make it really tight.
	5. Cut a piece of pantyhose or netting. Doesn’t have to be perfect, just bigger than your circle, we’ll trim it later. 6. Cut a length of embroidery thread and thread your needle. Thread it through the net and tie half a knot in 4 places just to get it positioned and started. Trim off some of the excess net.
	7. Then start looping your needle and thread around the wire, starting at the twisted wire end. When you reach the end, tie it off firmly and remove or trim the first 4 threads. I found it easier to sew with the net on top of the wire, spreading the net tight between 2 fingers (and sewing between them) spacing the loops about a quarter inch apart.Pull tight as you go and pull out the “tie-down” threads as you go. When you get to the end, tie the end threads together and trim some more of the net.

And there you have it. Works great and my fish don’t mind that its not super beautiful – they just are thankful that the leaves are picked up and not decaying at the bottom of their pond.

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