There is a large pond near to where I live next to a hospital. The pond was just a featureless concrete bowl that was half filled with stagnant water. The was swans in their as well……vicious ones at that..they would peck your lunch out your hands. There was a big sign up that said “DO NOT FEED THE SWANS”
So the pond has been in disrepair for years now…their used to be little boats years ago and people would come on nice days to row and eat ice cream. Nice for families and summer days. Those boats are long gone now, families dont come now, the only people that sit at the edges are staff from the hospital and the occasional school kid smoking a joint. Plus the usuall hardened drinkers enjoying the sunshine!
At the start of the year it started to change. Workman came and started to clear out all the junk and pile in earth. They were not filling it in… they were “landscaping” it.
The end result is actally quite nice…
I would like to show you a picture of what it was like before they did all the work but I couldnt find one. They put in earth around the edges so that it looked like a natural pond,reed beds and put some nice flowers as well. I watched the changes happening slowly. During the summer when I was walking by (I drop a client off at the hosptal regular) I noticed minnows in the pond. Some of them were pretty damn big as well. In fact I would go as far as to say that they were massive minnows. Perhaps one day some young kids will try and catch them and move on to fly fishing in the Kelvin …would be nice.
There is still a big sign up to say “DO NOT FEED THE SWANS”
You would think that after doing all that work they would want to encourage people to come and use it, they say it is because the pond cannot support the swans. They have been their for as long as I can remmember though.
Its funny how long Glasgow City Council takes to do stuff like that….I was emailing a guy from Canada for a while. He came over to visit Glasgow on business and we were going to meet up for a fish. But things being the way they are I couldnt make it. He went for a walk along the river and he commented about the sheer amount of rubbish that was in it and he wondered why the council did nothing about it……..I wondered about that too!!