By Helen Stedman
29 Apr 2026
The good news is that, contrary to our expectations, there is very little pollution in the pond - the phosphate and nitrate levels
and the turbidity is quite low.
Also, when we put a sample in a plastic tray over a white surface, it was obvious that the water is teeming with life.
All sorts of tiny creatures are visible when you zoom in with a phone camera. We are new to all this, but we have already identified
identified a two-spotted water-slater and a copepod. Have a look at the video of one of the critters below:
So all-in-all we are very pleased with our investigation, and think we are in a good place to make the pond a special place for wildlife.
29 Apr 2026
Managing the Pond by Pond Farm for Biodiversity
We are interested in the pond by Pond Farm, and want to manage it to enhance it's biodiversity - you never know, we might
even attract the famous great-crested newt!
The first step in doing this was to work out what condition the pond is in to start with. It's not clear where it's source i
is - the water probably comes in from under the wall with Appeton House, but this is far from obvious.
The pond is also right next to the road through Appleton, so we suspected it could be seriously polluted by road
runoff.
So we invested in a year's worth of water testing kit, Anna was trained in how to use it and away we went.
We took a sample, sucked a little up into the plastic reagent tubes and waited...
