Sue Vincent's Daily Echo

I am looking forward to April. Not just because it might have stopped raining and warmed up a bit by then, but because I have a feeling we have come to the notice of the water deities through our research for the weekend workshop… and I am getting fed up with being a plumber and dealing with aquatic mishaps.

It has all been about water lately, from pond, hot tub and aquarium, to broken bathrooms, leaking sheds and a washing machine that cheerfully floods my kitchen yet again whenever I  attempt to repair it. And that is without the saturated lawn that has developed a pond of its own and squelches underfoot, or the flooded roads and fields.

And then, this morning, when a pale and watery sun hovered indecisively in the sky, I arrived at my son’s home to find him, dressing-gown clad, watching the pond…

“I’ve just witnessed a miracle…”  I thought he was joking, but, looking at his expression, it appeared not. He had opened his bedroom blinds forty-five minutes earlier, only to see a dead fish on the side of the pond. It was one of the big goldfish and, given how low the surface of the water is compared to the path where it lay, it hadn’t got there by itself. Bird droppings big enough for a pterodactyl gave the culprit away… the heron had called.

The old pond was almost impossible for the herons to get at, but the new layout, while much more accessible, we hoped would still prove too difficult for the great birds to use as a sushi bar. Apparently not. The heron had probably been scared away by the opening of the electric blinds, but too late to save the poor fish that lay in a pool of blood and scattered scales.

Even so, my son went out to see if there was any hope. It takes him a while though so held little hope himself… what would take most people seconds, takes many minutes for Nick and fish do not do well out of water… and there was no way of being sure how long it had lain there.

By the time Nick made it out to the pond, the fish lay still, not even a flicker of the gills to offer a sign of life. There was no point returning it to the pond… it was way too late for that. He sat by the fish to wait for my arrival to dispose of the corpse.

Forty-five minutes after he had first caught sight of the fish through the window, as I pulled into Nick’s street… the dead fish began to flap about on the path. As quickly as he could, Nick scooped up the erstwhile corpse and returned it to the water. By the time I let myself into the garden, it was swimming normally and you would never have known there had been a problem apart from the blood and scales it had left behind. No wonder Nick was looking gobsmacked!

While that was indeed cause for celebration, it would appear that two of the babies Nick has been nurturing had provided the heron with a first course… Though we still live in hopes that they are hiding in the weeds, they were such friendly and curious creatures, used to anything approaching the pond being a source of food rather than the other way around…

So, I spent all morning on fish watch and erecting a makeshift heron fence around the pond. Then walked the dog in the rain and saw the muddy pawprints pooling on my nice, clean floor once again…

Seriously, I may have to write about some of the ancient springs around here, just to get the undines off my back. It is either that or roll on April…