Barred horsetail and more – Part 4 #PondLife

UPDATE: Part 4b Night of 6 MAY 2019, spotted what I think is the first inhabitant of the new pond, a surface-swimming beetle of some kind, perhaps a “diving beetle”. Photo is very blurry, it was dark, it was moving, it didn’t want to drop my phone…I will see if I can nevertheless ID it, just for the record. Having redesigned, realised that the internal shelving of the pond isn’t quite what it should’ve been for the best views… Anyway, a few plants are in now as is the weird double-handed milk jug we cadged off the blokes at the dump 20 years ago. Plants: barred horsetail, Equisetum japonicum. A tall marginal pond plant, with banded vertical stems. Hydrocotyle var. A pennywort oxygenator. Grows in the muddy margins and shallows of the pond. Scirpus cernuus, more colloquially known as bristle reed is in there too now as is Phragmites variegata, Norfolk reed. Also in the shallows, an intriguing plant called Juncus effusus, the corkscrew rush. Iris pseudacorus, the yellow water iris, and Primula rosea. That’s it for now. Full to capacity loaded with a few filtering and oxygenating plants. Needs some more landscaping although that patch at the back is going to be set aside as a micro-meadow, the repotted yucca will probably be relocated, although I’ve also taken 3-4 cuttings from the parent plant the main stem of which was dead. Oh, we also need to deal with the gravel and mud from the hole…but there’s stuff t...
Source: David Bradley Sciencebase - Songs, Snaps, Science - Category: Science Authors: Tags: Sciencebase Source Type: blogs