Have You Seen the Fish?

Over the past year, I've often asked this question. Unfortunately, the answer has been no.

I built a wildlife pond in my garden in 2012 and a botanist installed a mix of plants chosen to provide oxygen naturally. After frogs, water beetles and invertebrates had colonised the pond, I decided to try some fish.

At my local pet-shop I purchased two small goldfish and brought them home in a plastic bag, as if returning from the fair. I needed to find out if fish could survive in the pond; they were going to be the canary in the mine. Last June I put the goldfish in the water. I checked every day and was delighted to see them. They liked to nestle under lily-pads in the centre of the pond.

Pleased that my experiment had succeeded, I began to think about koi. Then, after a couple of weeks, the fish disappeared. I kept checking, but nothing there. Oh dear, I thought, perhaps a heron had eaten them. Or maybe they had died from a chemical imbalance in the water and a crow had scooped them up for breakfast.

As time went on, I stopped looking for the fish. There was plenty of wildlife in the pond after all: great diving beetles, water boatmen and so on. But I couldn't really hide my disappointment.

Then, one sunny day last week, I noticed two orange bodies under a lily-pad. Their fins were slowly moving as they raised their mouths and sucked in air. It was lovely to see the fish again. The prodigals had returned after one whole year. And, yes, they had grown; so there was oxygen in the water and enough food too.

All along the goldfish had been living in the depths of the pond. They had hunkered down and got through the winter: not only surviving, but thriving. I wont be buying koi now. I'm happy with my resilient goldfish.