New pond and its inhabitants

[bunchoffives]

My DS and I dug a hole and put in a small rigid pond liner at the end of May.

We were fortunate that we were given some frogs spawn and 1 fully grown frog. We also got a lily (£££££ ) and 2 cheap oxygenating plants. We have planted some moss and flowers round the edge and left an old wood log and some rocks for ground cover.

Since then new occupants have moved in: 3 water snails, a wriggling leachy type worm lots of gnats, some water skaters. Not sure how they knew to come but they have If you build it....

The frogs spawn are little froglets now. The water looks very clean.

What else should we expect to arrive in our pond? Is there anything more we could do to encourage the wildlife?

You might have a newt, fingers crossed. They just turn up somehow. Sounds like you are doing everything right.

Ohh a newt. Exciting! Are they protected? Would we have to build it a special newt palace or something?

We sometimes get newts and we've done nothing special. Great crested newts are protected but I don't think common ones are. Is there a shallow area for birds and hedgehogs to drink/wash?

I know what you mean about water lilies, they are much cheaper online if you don't mind a bare root one.

Ours aren't common, hush your mouth. I could sit and look at them for hours.

Ah, you must have the rare and beautiful middle-class newts

I wish I had a newt

Marginal plants (that you put in the very edges of the water) are good for wildlife, allow insect larvae and dragonfly nymphs etc to climb out of the pond. I've got a couple of big baskets of irises etc that are very pretty.

Don't whatever you do put a goldfish in there, they will chomp everything else!

I scooped out at lot of pond weed on mine yesterday and amongst it was an ex-newt .

This thread has reminded me to go and find out that type it was though!

Any suggestions for marginal plants Grumpla? We've bought a few alpine plants to place around the rocks and a couple of native ones.

So if it's a common newt you just leave them to it. If it's a great crested you build a palace? Seriously, I do hope we get some to keep Gary (!) the adult frog and the Steves (froglets) company. Obviously if we got a posh newt it would be named George Alex Louis!

There's a well-established pond at a country park near us where the DC were taken by the school to do pond dipping. Would you recommend we took a jam jar of water from there to quickly get some extra water life? Or would that also import alien disease?

If you're trying to attract wildlife then native species are your best bet- I've got purple loosestrife which is great for attracting insects, yellow flag (this can get thuggy and it seeds around so make sure you deadhead!), marsh marigold and a couple of non-native irises.

You could post on freecycle to see if anyone's giving away any pond plants. I'm always giving away yellow flags and had to split my loosestrife this year. You'll probably get some pond wildlife that way.

I wouldn't go get a jam jar since you already have a working eco-system.

Thanks EauRouge. Will locate some of those.

I hear you lljkk, that was my doubt. thanks.

I would not be putting water from somewhere else in your pond just In case of any disease. We had a newt once. She was called Norma ! Sounds like you have created a lovely area for wild life .

We have Isaac and Mine (newts) and don't you dare call them common.

Those are fantastic names