I will leave you in suspense about which seeds I chose, as I plan to draw the flowers and need to hone my non-existent artistic skills for your delectation. Because you deserve it.
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| The rose stays but a different emphasis will now emerge. |
When my pond was a pond, my gardener cut back the water lily pad to give the fish more space and found underneath it 3 newts. I had no idea they were there but was determined to channel my inner Gussie Fink-Nottle and nurture them. When the pond drained itself, I made sure they had a bathing pool in the new bog garden that I was creating in the space.
From my trusty local bargain shop I bought a black storage box which I filled with water and placed near the water lily pad. They needed a way in, which I provided with stepped bricks, and an exit mode. This was ensured by a slate kitchen chopping board, angled inside the tank for stability. Its slightly rough surface would offer claw holds for easy climbing. Thus they have all they need for their life cycle of eggs to hatchlings to juveniles to adults and can spend their time as they choose on land or water as amphibians. The females will lay their eggs under a leaf, glue them on and then use her back legs to fold the leaf around them.
How to help them hibernate was my next endeavour. They must have been managing for years by burrowing into soft soil but I wanted to build a 5* hotel for them. It has to be watertight, south facing and in a prime location near the pond and a garden with large leaves for cover. Mine is on a pedestrian route across a path from the pond with access to a patch of heucheras. I only hope the newts can pronounce that when they agree together to emerge - because I can't.
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| A Premier Inn for newts |
The main architectural structure of the hibernaculum is a frame made out of one of those lawn-edging, wooden coils held together by cunning wires - guess where from! This I bent into an S shape and tied it round firmly with string. The holes do not have to be large since a newt is happy in a narrow bed. A thin layer of coco coir substrate and moss made a roof (soil would do) and the whole thing was wrapped in a tarpaulin (slightly overlapping the doors and weighted down with stones). A final touch was a comforting mattress of dried hardwood leaves which would not go soggy and mouldy if rain were to permeate. There is nothing worse in life than a soggy, mouldy newt. Gussie Fink-Nottle would confirm that view.
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| Oh for that leafy bed! |
Footnote. G F-N is a splendidly comic character created by P.G. Wodehouse. His inebriated speech at the Prize Giving of Market Snodsbury Grammar School makes me chortle just to think of it. (Right-Ho, Jeeves).
