As leaders of this pond-dipping exercise we visited Clatto Reservoir to assess its potential on the day before visitors arrived when we were all but blown off the top of the dam by the force of the wind! However what we landed in our nets, including a couple of species of Ramshorn Snail, meant that we left the site with the belief that any members of the public who did appear for the event might well find it interesting.

Clatto Reservoir is retained by Fife Council as a Wildlife Site and made accessible to naturalists and anglers by the newly constructed path which leads up from the car park to the head of the dam. Visitors are welcome.

By contrast to our Friday experience, on the Saturday conditions were all but ideal, the wind was negligible and the sun was shining, and a total of 18 persons including children turned up.

We were readily assisted by helpers willing to carry our gear to the water’s edge, where in the absence of wind we were welcomed by a cloud of newly emerged Common Blue Damsel-flies, their wings glistening in the sunshine as they rose from the long grass when we brushed past. Equally colourful were the fewer number of Large Red Damsel-flies which were also present, and the azure sparkle from the rear end of Blue-tailed Damsel was occasionally seen.

Finding ourselves a convenient spot on the shores of the lesser limb of the loch below the newly constructed screen hide, we soon settled down to sweep through the open water and amongst the pond-weed with our nets which we then washed into clean water held in white basins to allow us to examine the catch. There was a great variety of swimming insects and crustaceans to take up our attention.

Amongst the bugs was an occasional Pond Skater and the much more plentiful related, if vegetarian, Lesser Water Boatmen (Corixa sp.) and the larger, carnivorous Great Water Boatmen (Notonecta sp.), rowing themselves around underwater with their strong, oar-like third pair of legs.

As far as crustacea were concerned, on the day freshwater shrimps (Gammarus) and water slaters (Asellus) were hard to find, but the tiny dark forms of numerous Cyprids, their carapaces distinctly hinged into two valves running the length of their tiny bodies, scuttered about the bottom of our containers. And sweeping in the open water with a plankton net brought a multitude of water fleas (Bosmina) to our attention.

However the highlight of the day for us was not amongst the faunal representatives of the pond, but on the banks beyond the field of horses on the right of the Clatto entrance from the public road, a great mass of purple beyond the deer-fence had caught the morning sun at our arrival. Neither of us had ever seen such an extensive patch of the spikes of what we presumed to be Northern Marsh Orchids. Maybe it is a good thing that they are so inaccessible.