But ponds also die, and my pond is showing signs of age.
Ponds die when they fill in with silt. Many beaver ponds meet this end eventually. Each spring high water washes silt into the pond. In the still water of the pond, the silt settles to the bottom, and over the years the pond fills in and becomes a meadow with but a small stream winding through it. A favorite pond on Loop Loop Creek has disappeared like this in the last forty years.
Ponds die when the outlet stream cuts down through the earth that dams the pond and drains it. The pond I visit each year to fish in the spring and fall will one day suffer this fate.
Other ponds, like the pond in the picture, that have no strong stream bringing in silt or outlet stream cutting down through the dam, will still die. This pond is gradually being choked with vegetation. The growth of each new year dies in the winter and falls to the bottom. One day this pond will be a marsh and then a meadow.
So I catch my pond on a beautiful day in October in the autumn of life. Like me, it is enjoying these warm days and brilliant colors of the season. And like me, it waits for what is ahead, unafraid, just waiting.
