Gone Fishing!!

A friend of mine has a lovely pond in the corner of her garden but no one has told her goldfish they should only have 2.4 offspring so they are effusive breeders. Recently my brother lost all but one of his fish to a poacher, (most likely to be a heron), so my friend agreed to give him half a dozen to re-stock his pond. In my ignorance I didn't imagine catching a few fish would take much time (I wondered why my friend seemed amused when I said as much).
I arrived at her house at the appointed time and while she made coffee I set to the task with a net and some food to draw them to the surface. You can imagine my frustration when the little blighters kept diving to the bottom of the pond or they jumped, just as my net got close. How the heck do they know to swim to the opposite side of the pond just as I got close to a little group. They had me running ragged around the pond much to the amusement of my friends (another friend who lives nearby had also popped in for coffee to see the sport!). The fish are obviously more intelligent than I gave them credit and I was extremely surprised that it took me nearly two hours to net five at which point I gave up. Actually I was only planning on catching six so I'll go back for the other one another day- well maybe!!




When I arrived home my brother was waiting to take them on their onward journey and I think I detected a little disappointment because they were so small, but they will grow and maybe the heron won't be able see them!!