Easter Sunday, early but springing

Been a busy weekend. The sun was shining, the air calm and clear, and it was time for the garden. Started by cleaning up that-what-the-dog-had-left-behind. Yuck. Once that was out of the way, did some major tidy-up: trimmed the pampas grass down ready for new year's growth (I don't know if now is the right time or not--some people did it early in the winter, some later, and some still have last year's grass all brown and dead--maybe there isn't a right time?) Pulled weeds, trying not to disturb the bulbs (it is almost a joy to weed here, after Sacramento, where every tiny root was concreted inside heavy clay; here the earth is sandy and light and easy and probably lacking in vegetable matter, that can be fixed).

Then, carried away by the loppers, started trimming all the dead stuff from the bushy/rambling/vinelike bushes at the end of the pond. Found that they were entangled in a chainlink fence, whose support posts had rotted, and which was only kept from splashing into the pond and giving the fish a heart attack by the way the bushes had wriggled through the mesh. It's gone now. Three large plastic bins-full of "brush" and several black bagsfull too. Two reels of rusting chainlink and three rotten four-by-fours. All out-of-the-way. The bush will grow back, I had to trim it nearly every week last summer, and it has roots all over the garden. Wouldn't be surprised if it's the reason the pond is leaking.

Planted some pansies: pink, purple, blue and white. In the "upstairs" garden, where deer don't go. And some new roses: "Rose de Rescht", a pink shrub rose; "Intrigue", a purple-plum flowering, everblooming floribunda; "La Reine", a large-flowered, pink bourbon rose, and two "Climbing Coral Dawn" everblooming climbers (these two in the "downstairs" garden, against the east-side trellis where they will see the afternoon sun.

The roses were bare-root from Home Depot. As usual with HD, these dry-rooted plants had been kept somewhere wet. They were already budding and needed to be planted immediately. Sometimes I think you don't so much buy roses from Home Depot, but rescue them, but that's a rather presumptuous thought. The prices are good and the roses have always "worked" for me. There are two Lady Banksia ramblers probably flowering all over the top of the hillside in a garden in Sacramento about now that were once dying in too-small pots at the end of the summer in Carmichael Home Depot. Sold off for a couple of dollars each, and eighteen months later they were huge and beautiful.

I used to think roses were boring, difficult and not worth bothering with. Then I saw the climbers and ramblers, old-fashioned and fragrant, at the Priory in Manton, and realised what roses really could be.

All the roses in florists here are pretty, perfect, scrolled buds, with absolutely zero perfume. I'd rather have ugly, petal-dropping, inconsistent blooms that smell like roses are meant to smell. Or a flamboyant coat of colour all over a trellis or fence for two or three weeks a year before being replaced by shiny, clean leaves. That's what roses should be.

Gave the pond some more water, the pump and filter running all weekend to clear some of the winter debris and give the fish some oxygen.

Watched the fish for ages. No sign of the big guy, my koi. All the baby black fish seem to be turning orange--pond guy was right when he said most goldfish are born black. This is good feng shui, apparently: goldfish represent riches. (Send by PayPal please.)

Watching the water like Ahab, waiting for the white whale.

And then, around three o'clock, there he was. Rising out of the murky depths, like a silver ghost, he showed himself and then disappeared under a floating water hyacinth. Moby! He survived the winter! (Looks like he now has a golden streak along his flank--and he has grown.)

Queequeg, no harpoon needed here, OK?