Fresh Pond Water

I unfortunately had a fair bit of sickness and the runs in the dogs last year, so I drained the ponds and refilled them.

We've had a really cold winter and the vet who home checked me for dog boarding told me that if there was anything in the water the cold would have killed it but I want to be sure!

There were quite a few frogs hibernating, so I hope they won't have suffered for the 24 hours it took to refill the ponds!

Just have to wait and see if we get frogspawn this year.

Honey bees?

I think I might be lucky enough to be hosting a honey bee nest. I lifted the lid off the compost bin to empty the hoover and about six bees came flying out! I was Very Scared and threw the lid on and ran away. I've popped back out, which is how I got the photo, and I'm pretty sure they are honey bees. I rang some local beekeepers and they are talking amongst themselves about hopefully coming out to double check that is what I've got (and ideally if there is any chance they can adopt them).

If they are bees they should be safe to pass in and out of the house, obviously I don't want to disturb them, but I fear Jacob might be a bit unhappy about it. Really, I'm not too happy with the positioning myself, could be a bit farther away from the entrances to the house - I won't be able to open my kitchen window while they are there. But to have a bees nest, I haven't seen one of those in the garden since I had some bumble bees, so I'm very excited!

Feeding Garden Birds

I read recently that feeding wild bird seed in a mix wasn't a very good idea. There's a lot of waste, and some birds won't visit. So recently I invested in a few more feeders, and now I feed peanuts, peanut chunks, sunflower hearts and niger seed. Which is all I could find in the local shops.

I have had chaffinches visiting since I planted the teasal a few years ago, but I was really pleased to see a goldfinch a couple of days ago. I've also had some great tits as well. I think there have been other birds as well, that I would have called 'sparrows' without my binoculars, but I'm not confident enough to really try to identify them in public.

It's not a very good picture, but on the green feeder to the left is my goldfinch. There were two, but one flew off while I was getting my phone out. I think I will ask my son to leave his digital camera out, so I can try to get some better shots.

Tadpoles now have legs, but every time I try to take a photo Fred sticks his head in the pond and picks out all the plants.

Tadpole Killer

Sadly one of the ponds is completely turning into something really nasty, and nothing appears to have survived. This is a shame, as it's the one that the frogs don't spawn in, and every year, I put some spawn/tadpoles into it from the other pond. They never seem to live.

The water has gone completely green! Everything was dead in there - no tadpoles at all. So am in the process of emptying it.


To show how green it is, here it is in a white container, against the grass. Please excuse very nosy terriers who wouldn't get out of the way (and tasted it - yuk!).


The other pond isn't doing too badly. Admittedly it's brown, but I'm not sure what to do about that - I think it's the soil at the bottom. Once the tadpoles have moved on I will investigate.


Also a short while ago I planted a couple of fruit trees for the wildlife.
Pear

and Apple.