It is always pleasing when our ponds balance out leaving nice clear water. The wildlife pond still has quite a bit of the green gunk although the plants are growing rapidly so it should clear soon and the newts don't seem to mind. The two fish ponds are now fairly clear and I can see my fish again. All seem to have survived the winter well.

When we made the first fish pond several years ago we started with just 5 fish but now we have over 30 (hence we have two fish ponds) . The big white fish with the red head in the middle of the picture below was one of the originals and mothered a lot of the others. Strangely the frogs seem to prefer the fish ponds to the wildlife pond.

Unfortunately the clearer water hasn't gone un-noticed by the heron and several mornings over the last week I've seen him standing in the field looking hopeful but the clear fishing line around the edge of the pond and lots of plants has so far deterred him.

A lot of the flowers around the pond came from a good friend of ours who was in the fire service with my husband. He had a lovely pond with many beautiful flowers and lots of wildlife but when he sadly died his wife couldn't manage the pond anymore so she passed on some of the flowers to us. Now whenever the Irises flower we have a lovely reminder of him.