Fish stories

We've been having a drought this summer around here. Consequently our pond is about a foot lower than it's normal level. Which is really not a big deal at all, you really can't tell, except that now the sunshine gets down lower in the water and the conditions are just perfect for some kind of algae to take over the entire pond.

Which looks ugly, and there's only so much "ugly pond" Tim can take. So he's been taking the scorching hot August days and getting in the pond (which is spring fed and very cold) and pulling it out by the roots. Then he slings it in the row boat and when that gets full he pulls it out and dumps it. He's worked over about 2/3 of the pond at this point. It's a decent size pond and it's slow work.

I've never been in the pond, except maybe to dangle a foot in, and you won't catch me in it unless it would be necessary. It's just that sometimes we see a snake in there and that creeps me out. I'm okay with our koi, the frogs, the occasional turtle or whatever else, but I'm not okay with snakes. Tim doesn't like them either so he kills them any chance he gets, so you only see one every once in a while, but still. They kind of creep him out too.

I digress, back to my story. Tim was cleaning out the pond this week when he calls to Noah, "I caught a fish, come and see." Well, that bears investigation, so we both run down there. Tim's in the pond working away on the algae and beside the pond is a bucket, in the bucket is a little koi about the size of my hand.

We were very pleased that our big ones had babies and that it had grown so big. I shout out to Tim to ask him how he caught the fish. He kind of laughs and says, "It swam into my pocket."

"It what?"

"Yeah, I felt something in my shorts and it swam into my pocket."

"So did that kind of freak you out?"

"Yeah, kinda. You know how I'm always half scared of what's in here anyway."

Noah and Simon enjoyed watching the fish. Noah thought he could catch it, but I wouldn't let him try. Then he decided he wanted to feed it so he got the fish food and put some in, but the fish wasn't interested so he pushed the food under the water, but still no interest.

It was about dinner time so we all went in to eat leaving the fish in the bucket by the pond. After dinner Tim went back outside and he came back to say that when he went out there the fish wasn't in the bucket. He said he looked around to see if it had flipped itself out of the bucket but he couldn't find it. Then he looked down by the rocks at the edge of the pond worried he would find it there, dead. But no, it was just inside the pond, but in the water and alive. Tim said he was breathing hard, but was fine. Apparently the fish did not take to our bucket, flipped himself out and over to the pond (probably over 10 feet away). Now, I think that's pretty impressive. And how did he know which way to go?