Frogs

I dug the first pond in this garden in 1990. By 2000 I had several ponds.

I now have two ponds in the back garden teeming with life.

This one is fed directly with rainwater that falls on the roof of my house.

And this one is fed from that one.

There’s a storage reservoir in the shape of lots of barrels. All fed with the same rainwater.

There are fish in the reservoir. I feed them in the colder months but during the warm months they eat all the midge gnat and mosquito larvae. They are right outside the kitchen door.

There’s another down pipe that takes water off the roof, and that goes through a tank full of mint, and trickles into the pond slowly after rain.

This system has taken years to evolve. One of the goldfish that died recently was won as a prize at the fair in Prospect park when my kids were young. It lived at least 20 years.

We get loads of newts dragonflies and other miscellaneous creatures. Occasionally we disturb a frog from the pond whilst gardening.

But today we had frog spawn. The very first frog spawn. We’ve never had them spawn here and I’ve been so disappointed

They’ve spawned in a plant tray on the front doorstep.

Or is it even they?