Water Features In The Garden
One of the best things you can add to your garden is a water feature. Water takes a so-so garden and puts it into another (better!) category altogether. Originally, there was a Mexican tiled fountain here, but it was broken. I’ve always preferred natural rock, so I replaced the tiled fountain with this interesting rock. My contractor took me to a nearby hillside where we hiked around for about an hour, eventually made our selection and paid the owner. In the states, the rock would have been placed using one of those mini forklift machines, but in Mexico, most things are done the old school way. It took six men several hours to wrangle the rock from the truck at my back gate, and then across about two hundred feet to the final location.
On most days, the honeybees and other insects, as well as birds, arrive early in the morning to drink. I love watching the birds take baths. Speaking of bees, I have a horizontal style bee hive just waiting for me to assemble and paint. I had bees when I lived in South Carolina, but they all died. I was never sure what happened, but one day they were fine, and a few days later, they were all dead. I suspect pesticide poisoning.
The bottles and bits of glass on top of the rock were found during an excursion to a nearby abandoned miner’s camp. Scattered about were old liquor bottles, perfume bottles (I guess entire families lived there) and small vials that would have contained injectable medication–maybe antibiotics or morphine? I don’t know much of the in-depth history of this town, but it has had a very colourful past. One day, I’ll go on an official mine tour.
