THE STREAM

Well, hardly a stream, more a field drain.

It begins in the field behind the garden where a previous tenant farmer dug a ditch alongside the bridleway at the upper edge.

He then let this drain away into the garden when it was a smallholding.

When we first came here at the start of 2005 the water ran into the garden area and became a bog - in the wild upper garden as shown here. The white flowers are wild angelica.

Out of this came a stream which tumbled down a steep bank into long grass and a further bog. There was a ditch by the hedge at the lower border of the garden

which emptied down a steep drop and became a stream which runs down the back of Rosside House, under the road in Rosside and into Rosside Beck.

This beck later joins Pennington Beck, becomes Dragley Beck and runs into the Leven Estuary near Sandhall.

To solve the bog-in-the-garden problem I dug a new course for the water down the middle of the lower garden and made two ponds. The upper one is a settling pond for silt washed down the stream.

Before the stream was dug I had to fill in two sumps - holes about a yard across and three feet deep with running water at the bottom - in one side and out the other.

During the digging I also found some blocked pipes - evidence of a previous drainage system.

The sound of running water, when there is not a drought, adds to the garden but trimming the grass beside the stream is a bit of a bind.

Fortunately I have a wife who will do this!