Boo! said the garden

Nervous gardening, which is my style, usually brings its little "Boo!" moments - those times when it's not so much you getting close to Mother Nature as much as it is Mother Nature's many-legged creations trying to get closer to you.

Of her various creepy and crawly offspring, the ones I loathe most are slugs - followed by snails, earthworms (no lectures on how garden-friendly they are, thanks) and any scurrying things with many legs that live beneath pots or in cracks.

Yesterday there was a brief respite from the near constant rain, so I ventured out into the garden to see what my plants were doing. As I bent down to smell my favourite rose, my gaze fell upon a gently quivering pile of something like translucent jelly.

Wild, panicky images of monstrous slugs and other oozing creatures filled my head as I backpedalled down the path...

...until I suddenly realised that it was the water-absorbing crystals that I had accidentally spilt while potting some herbs a couple of days back. The crystals had lived up to their name and absorbed unholy amounts of water (well, it's been raining constantly!) and swelled up to jellyfish proportions.

Phew. Who says country life is boring?

PS. I had bought the crystals because the manufacturers claimed that when mixed with the compost in small amounts, they would cut down on watering and keep the plants moist. They'd better do the job after the fright they gave me!