It felt as if it had been a while since I’d last walked around my garden and I wanted to check how full the pond was. We had so much rain the other night I thought it might have over flowed.

As it was full of duckweed as usual (I once had a pond that had no duck weed and no blanket weed, unfortunately the duck weed came from somewhere and now I have it in carpet-loads) I decided to skim some off.

Of course I had to look at the creepy crawlies that got caught up with the weed before I piled it in a corner so those same creepy crawlies could make their way back to the water. Imagine my delight when I saw a wriggler with a very red stomach. It was a newt! It wasn’t a full sized one but I was delighted. I thought they only went into the pond when they were breeding. May be it’s not for me to set moral boundaries for wild life, but when I found two more, equally small, I felt they were too young to be mating. Note to self: find out more about newts.

After fishing about the pond for a bit, getting muddy, wondering why I didn’t have a grandchild with me while I did this, I made the rest of the circuit. My garden isn’t huge but I had to inspect the plants as I went. I found several patches of daisies. Not seven that I could have put my foot on, but still. There were also primroses flowering, the bulbs are all coming up and the birds are busy.

I think this means it’s spring! Even though it’s currently blowing a gale and the jackdaws are imitating tea-leaves that have escaped from the tea bag, and the sky is definitely grey, in my mind the world is preparing itself for a new year full of flowers and fragrance, and newts partying on down in my pond. Hooray!