Scarborough Unfair

Now that the school summer holidays have arrived, its made me think about my own younger years and the family holidays that we used to have.  Butlins at Skegness will always be my childhood favourite (Monorail! Chair Lift!) and Scarborough - well I may have liked Scarborough but it doesn't seem to particularly like me.

Exhibit A - trip to the Blue Dolphin Caravan Park where it rained pretty much all the time and I got the mumps and had nothing but tomato soup for days.  Even winning the darts competition and the greatest bouncy castle in existence couldn't repair the damage.  I think I was eight years old.

Exhibit B, the morning of departure for a few days in the seaside town a couple of years ago resulted in me doing my back in on the morning we were supposed to travel on our non refundable booking.  The hotel was lovely, our room?  Top floor no lift.  I shuffled around Scarborough and Whitby like one of the walking dead.

Below are a selection of pictures from that fateful trip.

A baby penguin at the Sea Life Centre

These are from Whitby.

The Fisher King

 Since moving house one of the new things that we've had to get to grips with is that we are now the custodians of a decent sized pond, complete with approximately 17 goldfish of various sizes and colours and sundry frogs.

 Novices would at best describe our knowledge of looking after ponds, but we have successfully managed to change the UV light that cleans the water, without electrocuting the fish, or indeed, ourselves.

As for potential predators, I have read that a heron can clear a pond of fish in one sitting but cats tend to avoid them due to their fear of water.  With the honourable exception of Bengal cats who love the stuff.

Would anyone care to hazard a guess what type of cat our neighbour owns?

Meet Bob, the beautiful Bengal that seems to rule the roost in the neighbourhood.

Silent Bob, The Bengal Cat

Our neighbour alerted me last week on my return to work, extremely apologetic as her cat, had brought in a large goldfish still flapping in its mouth and deposited its catch in the middle of her living room before deciding to bite its head off.  Our neighbour is elderly, but refreshingly honest.

I told her not to worry, as this is the kind of things cats do.  As former cat owners ourselves, we've seen first hand just what determined hunters they can be and the "gifts" they return with.

On Saturday, we found another fish, minus its tail and fins by the side of the pond.  If we where going to keep the remainder safe, a solution was to be found.

Neither Terry or myself wanted a net across the pond, which would spoil the look of it and the garden.  A local fish stockist showed us a movement sensitive device that could be plugged into the hose pipe and shoot a stream of water at the trespassing cats.  We didn't hold much hope out for that option for a water loving cat.  It would also mean having the hosepipe trailing across the garden and in all likelihood resulting in us tripping over the hose and/or getting sprayed for good measure.

After hitting the internet we came up with a solution, a ring of floating hexagonal lattices that are joined together and sit around the edge of the pond just below the surface, thus preventing Bob from being able to reach in from the side of the pond and take his fill.

The hexagonal lattice in place

So far, the deterrent appears to be working.  We've spotted Bob a couple of times on the edge of the pond but he hasn't made any further kills - as far as we know.

Taking care of the pond is going to be a work in progress.  We'll keep you updated if anything of interest occurs.