To celebrate #PondWeek, we've invited pond lovers from across the county to share their passion with us. Barbara created her pond during lockdown and it's attracted many welcome guests!
"I created a very little pond in a polytunnel as a Covid project last year in January 2021. Our neighbour has a large pond and we live in a rural area so we soon had visiting wildlife making their home in the new pond.
"Our first set of tadpoles are now adult frogs as seen in the photo and we had a lot of frogspawn this year.
"I keep the tunnel door open most days, to let the insects in and sometimes birds come to drink. Birds bring in all sorts of seeds and bugs and snails that take up residence around the pond . The frogs seemed to pass winter in the spinach bed just under the surface and they reappeared during the warmer days of February. They love eating spinach, lettuce and rocket. In the summer I have seen tomatoes and carrot tops nibbled. Occasionally I put a little cat food or pellets out for them to eat, and now they come out when they hear me coming! Otherwise they sit under some slate slabs all day. I do not have a slug or snail problem since the frogs have arrived.
"We seem to have frogs in every corner of our acre of garden and some are getting very big. It surprises me that our frogs are different colours from each other and some of them look very old and thin, so I suppose they have migrated from other ponds. In March we noticed groups of them outside the tunnel in the long grass. They seemed to be waiting to get in .
"It has been a very worthwhile project and I have learned a lot from it. Also I have made new friends as the word seems to have got around and people drop in to see the pond. Funny really!"
