I love gardening and especially love to grow things that we can eat or use in some way. Although there are some plants that I just have to grow because they are beautiful, sunflowers being a particular favourite of mine. Both my boys love to help, they have planted a lot of our seeds and sets for our veg garden at home and at the allotment.
Unfortunately we have a bit of a slug problem in our garden and despite our best efforts, last year most of our seedlings were eaten. We found some frog spawn in a puddle at the side of a local farm track in spring and decided to save some of the frogspawn (which would probably dry out) and introduce it into our garden. To do this we needed to create our own pond.
We gathered supplies; a plastic bucket with broken handle, rocks, bricks, aqueous soil, plastic pond planting pots and plants. We chose three plants, which don’t look much now as they are still small, but will grow throughout this year (we need to order some bigger pots for them!). The Hornwort is an oxygenator, which is essential to ponds; an Iris, which is a marginal plant and will have beautiful blue/purple flowers; and a small lily, which will cover the surface with little lily pads and flowers, creating shade for the tadpoles.
First we placed the stones at the bottom of the tub (which had already filled with rain water, as tap water is not good for tadpoles) and then a brick and pot for the plants to sit on.
We filled the pots, lined with left over garden fleece, with the aqueous compost and planted the Iris and Lily in their pots, with stones on top to weigh them down in the water. The Hornwort (weighted) can be dropped in as it doesn’t need any soil.
We then added our frogspawn, which appears to be doing well as I have spotted a few tadpoles in the pond.
I know our pond looks pretty ugly right now, but when the plants grow it should look much better. If you have more money you can buy larger plants and have your pond looking much more mature when newly planted. I’ll update this post when it eventually begins to look like an established pond.
I’m joining in with LarabeeUK‘s fantastic Kids in the Garden Blog Hop with 13 other bloggers. There is also a linky if you would like to share your own Kids in the Garden blog post. Just link up below, add the badge to your blog post and comment on this post and at least one other.
Check out for the other posts on social media with the hashtag #kidsinthegarden
J x
Maria at Crafty Cooks says
I heart this idea. With an inquisitive older cat (20years) though any area of open water is fair game for him to drink! I can’t wait to see pictures of your pond as it matures, and also of the frogs that you rear!
Leandra says
I love this!!!! Thanks so much for joining us for #kidsinthegarden xx
Sarah Burns says
this is such a cute idea. One of neighbours has a large pond so we sometimes head to take a look in there at the fish and other creatures x
#kidsinthegarden
Plutonium Sox says
This is a lovely idea. I’m not keen on full sized ponds in children’s gardens so this is a really good compromise.
Nat.x
Clare's Little Tots says
I used to make little ponds like this as a kid such fun and a great way to engage them in learning.
jess & bodhi says
#kidsinthegarden love this idea! we used to have a pond at our old house and i miss it, would be lovely to get some frogs or newts
Sara Skillington says
What a great idea, Jenny! I love that it is not too difficult for children to join in helping with and I can imagine the fun and excitement there will be watching everything grow. Such a lovely way to encourage children into the garden and to have a love of nature 🙂 Pinned. #KidsintheGarden
Our Cherry Tree says
This is really cool! We have an old pond in our garden but are not going to refill it with water – I like the idea of having something little like this instead. #HowToSunday
Kerry says
This is a really cute idea, keep us updated about your tadpoles #HowtoSundays
Laura @ Dot Makes 4 says
This is really cool! I love this idea! I’m definitely going to try this with Dot.
#HowtoSunday
Bear and Cardigan says
What a great idea. I had a small water garden years ago with just a lily in it, it was lovely and you have inspired me to do it again! #KidsintheGarden
Fiona Cambouropoulos says
What fun to watch it grow and educational too