The other day, at the break of dawn, I glimpsed a heron standing sedately on my neighbour's fence, before it took off into the sky.
In this urban environment such sights are a thrill.
My pond has been doing quite well. Water lilies leaves have spread; and the new oxygenating plants appear to be thriving in the weird contraption I created for them: two plant pots super-glued together, and then weighted down with a stone.
The fish all six of them are beautiful, thriving on the flaky food that's £9 a small bag.
Two years ago it was a different story.
I was thrilled that summer when I realised that tiny fish had hatched. Then life elsewhere took me away from the garden.
By the time I re-checked the pond it was already winter, and larger fish were dying. I thought they might have been caught by ice, for the water quality looked good, and oxygenating plants covered the surface.
It took me a while to realise that something was badly wrong; and that beneath these oxygenating plants was only a thin layer of good water. Beneath this, decomposing leaves from the nearby willow tree had created a poisonous layer through the depths and down to the mud.
Horrified by this discovery, during one bitterly cold week in January, I attempted to save the lives of the fish. But by then it was already too late. Tiny ones floated on the surface with blank lifeless eyes.
I then emptied the entire pond, filtering and double checking ever pint of water desperately searching for any which were still alive. In the end I found about twenty, the larger fish having all succumbed.
In bitterly cold weather, I then scrubbed clean the pond. Then I took care to refill it properly, before gently replacing the tiny fish.
Over succeeding weeks they continued to die. One by one. Until there only eight precious left.
At least these would be the strongest, I consoled myself. And indeed they were. And they thrived.
I watched, as over time, they changed colour from blacks to gold. Three changing that first year, and three changing only this summer.
Then early this year, one of the gold ones disappeared, and another I found floating with curled body and blank eyes. I put this down to cats or perhaps over amorous frogs.
So now I was now down to six. Five golden ones, and one which stubbornly remained dark. All summer I fed them, and spent time trying to ensure that good water quality was maintained. Topping up their water during the so-called drought.
Recently, with temperatures falling, they were becoming less hungry.
The other evening I went outside later than usual, and couldn't see them. I guessed they were hiding under lily pads, or were perhaps deeper in the pond, imagining sleep.
Then yesterday, I sat and waited for them.
They had by now become quite tame, and would rise to the surface waiting to be fed. I knew them by name. I knew their variation of shape and colour. Flyte, for example, had a white band on one side. Oblivion was the largest. Infinity the smallest. Celtic had the most beautiful tail fin. Copper had the deepest gold, and then there was the one which still lurked in the shadows, dark in colour.
The water was still. The only ripples, mosquito emerging from its pupae case. I dropped flakes on food on the water surface, yet no fish rose to feed.
My pond was empty.
The fish had gone.
And that was when I recalled the heron, a few days previous, and its steady flight away from my garden.
