Wading

I've been bugging W to help me with this job for a couple of weeks.  He kept saying it was too cold - so I said I would get in the water, he just needed to be there for me bounce opinions off regarding the extent of clearance, and help with removal of the stuff loaded into trugs.  

After breakfast, I donned the waders, and clambered in.  Once we got started, it really didn't take very long - we were done before lunchtime.  I did a pretty extensive clearance of the surface vegetation.  This is now all spread out around the pond, to allow any insects to escape and return to the pond.  We found a few newts, but only one dragonfly nymph.  Last year, we had help from Ian and Barley, and we found a lot of dragonfly nymphs, which we returned to the pond.  It was just a little later in the year (17th April).  Dragonfly larvae climb out of the pond on the weed to emerge into the final insect, so perhaps by doing the job just a little earlier we managed to avoid so many coming up into the surface weed prior to finally emerging?  Or maybe we are not going to get so many dragonflies this year.  It's a difficult balance between keeping the pond clear enough for us to enjoy the water, and leaving it for the wildlife. 

W has spent the afternoon in the workshop, I played the flute for a while and looked at blips.