Closer to the hare

Late one recent afternoon, in a change to the advertised programme, this Brown Hare appeared in a field in front of the house. Consequently, I was able to nip out of the back door, scoot around the rear of the property, use our parked cars as cover to approach a bit closer and, happily, not have a window between the camera and the subject.

We have had a few lovely days of weather this past week, quite Spring-like, with enough warmth to encourage us to begin work on a pond in the front garden. As is the way with these things, there was much standing around discussing options, measuring, hammering in pegs, further discussion, more measuring, moving of pegs, a bit more measuring and some tweaks of peg locations. Part of the problem is that the site isn't flat, and also our ideal location for the pond is where all the services enter and exit the property. Eventually we hit upon a solution which satisfied us both (and I guess Scottish Water, Scottish and Southern Electricity Networks and Orkney Islands Council) and we haphazardly calculated that there would be an eight inch slope across the width of the pond.

Estimating where the deepest part of the pond would be, we dug a small test pit to see if there was enough depth of soil before we hit bedrock, as our experience at the rear of the house when putting in poles for a washing line had been rather fraught. The pit was not quite two feet deep when we broke through a thin layer of clay and hit sandstone. Not ideal, but better than feared and it'll have to do.

Philosopher...

or ploughman?

As I type, Orkney is experiencing a severe gale, hailstones and sufficient wind chill to keep temperatures below freezing all day, so pond progress is temporarily on hold. It feels like an admin day.

[Hurriedly checks stocks of tea bags and ground coffee]