Things to do with an old bath...make a wildlife 'pond'

From back: Livia Augusta, Sandi Toksvig and Linda LaHughes

When we lost our three beloved Indian runner ducks to a (presumed) fox attack last year, the situation was made even more upsetting by the old bath in our garden, which had been used as a duck pond, acting as a constant reminder every time we went outside. My suggestion that we got rid of it was met with indignation from Ian who had spent an entire weekend digging the hole for it. It also went against the original ‘recycling’ concept for using it in the first place.

Then we hit on the solution. A wildlife pond. We were pretty sure it was deep enough for water plants to thrive, and would provide a useful drinking spot for the many birds that use our garden.   A fitting testament to three ladies who loved the water.

As with many of our plans there was an initial burst of activity, followed by weeks of negligible progress, and then a final frenetic weekend to finish the project.

We started by discussing how to make the bath look less like a bath. This was mainly driven by me; there was just something about the stark whiteness of the bath with its shiny silver handrails that made it difficult to see it as a wildlife pond. I initially suggested we buy a pond liner and tuck it over the edges of the bath. This suggestion was vetoed on the basis that buying a pond liner made having the bath underneath pretty unnecessary. I then suggested we buy four planks of decking and make a decorative edge- sort of resembling a raised bed. This was vetoed on the basis of unnecessary cost and associated faff of walking back from B&Q with four enormous planks of wood (again).

Finally, Ian had a brain wave- we could use the roll of green material that had been under the bed for years (one of my ebay bargains) and tuck that over the edges of the pond like a pond liner. I expressed concern that it would simply float. Nonsense! Ian would sew pockets into the fabric strips so that we could add stones to weigh it down. I was slightly concerned that this project was spiralling into the realms of insanity, but happy to let Ian get on with it. True to his word, by the end of the weekend, the white plastic-y bath had been transformed into, well, a bath covered in green fabric. 

At this point, because it still looked a lot like a bath covered in strips of green fabric, I suggested we add some of the more attractive logs from the logpile to provide insect shelters and break up the shape.

We stood back and looked at it critically.

There was no disguising it. Here was a bath, inexplicably covered in strips of green fabric, and now surrounded with bits of wood wedged in at all angles.




At this point, the weather intervened. It became unexpectedly cold- too cold to risk adding pond plants which could have been killed off by a frosty night. So we waited and busied ourselves with setting up an extensive series of water butts, boxes and flower pots so that we could fill the pond with rainwater.

By early April things were looking up. Not only had the weather improved but word of our ‘pond’ had spread and led to two offers of pond plants from friends and one offer of frogspawn, which was carefully collected in a large jam jar and carried home in a re-enactment of an Enid Blyton story.

Ian adding the frogspawn to the 'pond'

Happily, the 'pond', eccentric as is certainly is, has been a runaway success wildlife-wise.   The frogspawn is now a mass of wiggling tadpoles which grow larger every day (possibly at the expense of each other), and the water lily and other unknown pond plants have established and are putting out new shoots.  We've also acquired a water snail from somewhere (yes, definitely a water snail, not just a snail who happens to have fallen in the water), presumably he was hiding out in the water plants. 

 I'm slightly concerned at the combination to fresh new shoots and goats, but so far their location in the centre of the bath seems to have been enough to deter nibblers.  We will see!



Around 3 weeks' later: much larger tadpoles wriggling in the morning sun.