Pond project takes flight

Richard Negus returns to Lodge Farm to find the Barkers’ new pond turning into a real haven for wildlife

- Richard Negus

Norfolk reeds in their winter hue, the colour of Dijon mustard, sweep in an arc around one bank length of the pond. The reflection of an ancient oak is on the water, velvet-like and menacing. As black as pitch, it reaches out over the furthest and deepest reaches of the chilling ripples.

In the shallows it is crystal clear and free of terrors, mirroring the overcast winter skies. Gravel of varying grade is revealed accompanied by haphazard masonry, clods of ancient vintage. An array of aquatic herbage rolls to and fro in an eddy caused by the north-easterly breeze. Four patrolling mallard swim in pairs. They are oblivious to my gaze. The ducks dabble in the shallows while the drakes cruise behind; watchful in the proprietorial manner of a boyfriend unsure as to the faithfulness of his beloved.

I check my watch. With surprise I realise that this winter scene has held my attention for more than threequarters of an hour, 30 minutes more than I usually allow myself for lunch.

It is time to get back to the hedge I am laying. I stand up with a grunt, knees stiff, from behind my hide of bramble and suckers. The mallard erupt in a cascade of spray and droplets.

No rainbow appears in their wake, it is too gloomy. However, their theatrical take off, hiss and quack followed by whispering wings departing in a semaphore of green, purple, orange, yellow and white, provides sufficient colour. Leaving the pond to return to its wind-tremored isolation, I trudge back to my waiting billhook, stakes and thorn hedge.

The Barker boys’ new pond at Lodge Farm is no longer merely a muddy hole. It is now a place for ducks, a place for all wildlife. This series has followed the regeneration of this sizeable wetland habitat since the T-shaped pond was cleared some 14 months ago (If you build it, they will come, 27 March 2019). The change from those days when it was a Somme-like crater to its current state is marked.