Serendipity!

@Fleura (28956)
United Kingdom
April 21, 2022 10:14am CST
Now our new pond is ready for adding plants, so I’ve been gathering up all the ones I’ve bought or been given over the past several months (and even years, in a couple of cases!) and potting them up into bigger pots to put in the pond. The problem was I kept having to buy more of those plastic ‘pond baskets’, and I know that they are really rather flimsy and as soon as the plant grows to fill the basket it very quickly bursts out of it and the basket is destroyed and has to be thrown away - more unnecessary plastic waste. At least with ordinary land plastic plant pots I can use them over and over for many years. So I was browsing for alternative suggestions for things I could use, and on some pond forum I found a suggestion to use laundry baskets or even shopping baskets. That seemed like a good idea but I couldn’t think where I would get any shopping baskets unless I just stole a few from the supermarket - they are not an item I have ever seen for sale anywhere. Occasionally an old one gets dredged out of the river where some yob has thrown it in, but that’s about the only place I’ve ever seen one outside of an actual shop. I mentioned it to my partner, just in case he should happen to see one anywhere. And then, two days later, someone in the village was having a clear-out and posted on the village Facebook page that they had left unwanted items on the roadside for people to take (I’m not on FB so I can’t join the group, but I can have a look now and then to see what’s going on). And guess what? Among the items were three metal shopping baskets, just what I wanted. How lucky is that? So with a piece of hessian to line it (from the stash of fabric bits I inherited from my mother) the basket is now settled in the pond as a new home to a marsh marigold I was gifted. Serendipity indeed! All rights reserved. © Text and image copyright Fleur 2022.
8 people like this
5 responses
@LadyDuck (454987)
• Switzerland
22 Apr 22
You were lucky, I am so glad when I can find what I need without spending money. It is the time of the year I need to clean the pond.
1 person likes this
@LadyDuck (454987)
• Switzerland
22 Apr 22
@Fleura I am not on my computer right now, I do not have the photos, I will post one to show you.
1 person likes this
@Fleura (28956)
• United Kingdom
22 Apr 22
@LadyDuck Thanks!
1 person likes this
@Fleura (28956)
• United Kingdom
22 Apr 22
I didn't know you had a pond, what is yours like?
1 person likes this
@JudyEv (323745)
• Rockingham, Australia
22 Apr 22
Did you feel like you'd found gold? I would have.
1 person likes this
@Fleura (28956)
• United Kingdom
22 Apr 22
It's amazing how often I find just exactly what I wanted. Almost enough to make me believe in 'the power of positive thinking' and 'the universe will provide' and all that sort of twaddle
1 person likes this
@JudyEv (323745)
• Rockingham, Australia
23 Apr 22
@Fleura Vince travelled in a group to Nepal and one of them was always on about the 'power of the universe'. He'd always say it was just a happy coincidence. But it's a good feeling however it happens.
1 person likes this
@Fleura (28956)
• United Kingdom
23 Apr 22
@JudyEv Yes, if I believed in that then I would have to believe that bad things that happen are also the result of my 'negative thinking', or that I just didn't 'harness the power of the universe' well enough to save my friend from dying, and all that sort of thing.
1 person likes this
@allknowing (130088)
• India
22 Apr 22
Indeed a happy coincidence. Do post a photo once your pond starts looking colourful. With the exception of lotus and the water hyacinth I never knew there were other aquatic flowering plants
1 person likes this
@allknowing (130088)
• India
22 Apr 22
@Fleura Wow!! What a colourful pond that will be.
1 person likes this
@Fleura (28956)
• United Kingdom
22 Apr 22
@allknowing I will let you know!
@Fleura (28956)
• United Kingdom
22 Apr 22
Right now it's mainly just a large patch of murky-looking water, but I'm hoping it will look much nicer in the summer when the plants really get going. I have planted quite a selection so we should have water lilies in yellow and pink, irises in yellow and blue, water mint (little bluey-purple flowers), purple loosestrife (tall spires of purple flowers), cotton grass (fluffy white heads) as well as some reed-type plants of various types. And the marsh marigolds of course. I'm sure I'll write about it again soon!
1 person likes this
@Ronrybs (17783)
• London, England
21 Apr 22
Now I know why our Tesco has tagged all their baskets! A good idea, you'd think they would use a better material than some flimsy plastic that disintegrates as soon as you look at it
1 person likes this
@CarolDM (203478)
• Nashville, Tennessee
21 Apr 22
Amazing how creative some get with planters. So much can be uses. Yours are very pretty.
1 person likes this