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  • Charles and Kimmy Williams are among the households on the water garden tour this Saturday. Derrick Miller/The Duncan Banner

    Charles and Kimmy Williams are among the households on the water garden tour this Saturday.
July 26, 2012

Tour sees change to evening

Participation up for Water Garden Society event

Rebeka Rutledge The Duncan Banner

DUNCAN — If the heat of the day has kept some residents from visiting the homes featured in the Water Garden Society of Southern Oklahoma’s Water Garden Pond Tour in the past, later hours this year may get them out to see them when it happens this weekend.

For the 18th year of the tour, co-chair Cindy Ward tried to figure out ways to keep homeowners and tourists out of the heat as much as possible.

While it was too late to change the date to June, Ward thought about moving the viewing hours from the heat of the day to a later time.

This year, the independent tours will be 4 to 9 p.m. Saturday.

“It’s so hot during the day but just after 4:30 or 5, we have a lot of shade in our yard,” Ward said.

There is also an additional benefit to having later hours for the tour as the homeowners will be able to show off an aspect to their water garden properties that they haven’t had the opportunity to before.

“Many of the ponds have lights around their ponds and with it getting darker, they’ll hopefully be able to show them,” said Ward.

Ward and her husband Cecil have participated in the tour for several years. This year’s tour will feature 12 homes, a jump from the seven that participated last year. Ward said there are four new members.

While the heat is just as intense as last summer, the rainfall that last year lacked has made a big difference in the quality of the pond areas, Ward said. Now, the only thing they are worried about is the huge amount of grasshoppers.

“This year we were worried about not having any flowers but this year we grew them in my husband’s shop,” she said. “The grasshoppers are everywhere but haven’t eaten too many of the plants.”

Last year, the Wards saw about 60-70 people out at their garden during the tour and hope to see many more on Saturday. Locations include seven water gardens in Duncan and the remaining number in Comanche and Elgin.

In the past, there have been booklets with the locations and directions of each site, however, in trying to keep costs down, this year flyers are being used. They can be found on the windows of several local businesses.

If you would like to pick one up, they can be found at ACE Hardware, Backdoor Bling, Stockman’s, Montgomery Landscape, Dave’s Cave, Expert Tire and Cash and Dash.

Ward said pond tourists can see some spectacular sites this year, some with small and some with large ponds. One of the larger ones features a waterfall. Another was dug by the homeowner herself with some help from her son.

“We really have some good ponds,” said Ward.

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