Jubilee pond a year on

This is the pond we built last year when we had the extra bank holidays for the jubilee and the Royal wedding. It is looking much more established and the aquatic plants are beginning to reappear. There's quite a lot of blanket weed but I'm hoping to control it with some barley straw.

There's always so much going on in the pond. The frogspawn has hatched and there are tadpoles swimming around. There's usually at least two frogs and, much to our excitement, the newts are back in residence. There are several pond skaters zipping around on the surface.

I could look at it all day long.

This is the newly finished pond last year.
The water lily is growing and the leaves should make it to the surface soon.