Garden Diary: Sound

Last week, after about three inches of rain, the Lockatong Creek below the garden was flowing at full white water pitch. At such times, the roar of the water, from a distance of about a quarter mile, is a distinctive part of the garden.

In the 18th and 19th centuries the power of the stream was harnessed to run mills. Hard to think of this rather pristine rural environment as one of the nurseries of the industrial revolution, but it's so.

Here the water totally obscures an old mill dam at the bridge I cross to get home.

By the next day, the flow had declined dramatically.

Except in the driest times, the sound of the Lockatong is a constant in the garden. At times almost imperceptible, at times fading into the background of consciousness.