My Garden Wild Life

Several morning over the last week my pond has had visitors. Not the usual cheeky heron but three ducks waddling and swimming about. They turn up about this time each year. Always one female and two drakes. Admittedly they have cleared some of the weed and algae from the pond but Oh they do make a mess and they've eaten all the tadpoles. Reluctantly I've chased them off each time. It's not as if they are short of water space around here. They've three great lakes to swim on over in Nene Park.

I was just sitting down to a late breakfast in the conservatory this morning when I spotted 'Hissing Sid' basking in the warm sunshine. He's a grass snake and has been around for a few springs and summers now. He was half out of the water on the water fall. I grabbed the camera and creeped up on him, OK or her! He has a large fat bulge in his belly. Was it a bird, one of my fish or one of the frogs? Well what ever he had swallowed it will keep him going now for a few days. It's amazing to watch his elastic mouth open to swallow whole a frog whose girth is several times larger than the snakes.