The pond is still a murky mess, but the fish are eating, and doing well. They’re spooked because they can’t see in the murk, but they know our voices (try talking to your fish: “Here, fishie, fishie, fishie!”) and will come when called to eat.
I’ve also added some bacteria, which hopefully will help.
I don’ t know how many times I’ve been out there today. But we’re gaining on it, and we hope to have a cleaner pond soon.
Good for you. It’s nice to see your labors are not in vain.
We’ve gotten these little guys to eat out of our hands. They all have names. They’re all individuals. We refuse to lose any of them.
Our wee, little pond (maybe 120 gallons?) has been ok this summer when it comes to algae and yuck, and I am hoping it stays that way with the recent heat and humidity visiting Boston (it is welcome to go away). My spouse surprised me with the addition of three goldfish to the water garden, which I only noticed yesterday (apparently they had been there for about a week and all eyes were on me to see when I would notice: duhhhh…).
Because the local raccoon population uses our small and quite raccoon-wadable/fishable pond as their watering hole (which I don’t begrudge them), we keep any fish cheap and replaceable. Over the past 3-4 years with this strategy, I can report that 10 cent “feeder” goldfish go belly up well before the raccoons manage to eat them. 25-40 cent goldfish, however, do surprisingly well. One year they even made it through the Fall and so were invited inside to dwell in a 10 gallon tank. Their names, by the way, were Minimus, Medius and Biccus Dickus (who was a real prick and chased the other two around all the time). Alas, I didn’t clean out my water garden well enough the next spring before putting them back in it. Algae bloomed, they got ick and went belly up.
The only plants we use are water lettuce and water hyacinth, both of which float and so can be lifted out at night before the raccoons sample them to shreds (which I do begrudge) and placed in a basin on the high table near by. Said plants have multiplied enough by now that I leave a good bunch in each evening, which should help the fish hide from the raccoons, as well as clean the water. They also have a minature Colleseum (sp?) to swim in and out of, which we picked up at a fish store.
All in all, I’m pleased to have fish back in my water garden and life, but still worried a bit that the water quality may go off.
What did us in was a 2″ rain, my failure to adjust the ph, and a half week of near-100 degree temperatures. PLUS we found out that when we set up, the instructions talked about a tiny adjustment cutting off water flow to the right side of the skimmer, when we have a left-side UV filter installation. Those UV lights are very pricey, so we wanted to get our second, right-side one next year, not this; but it turns out the little blocking plate isn’t there, nor do I have one. I improvised with a piece of plastic, and hope that sending ALL, instead of half, the water past the UV light will help a lot. I should have spotted that this spring when I set up, but I was unfamiliar with the skimmer design and didn’t know what to look for. I have become intimately acquainted with that piece of equipment by now, and hope that we have made a good improvement with a piece of plastic that was once a package for a box knife.
YOu should see it: we have rocks and a pump in the bottom of a paint bucket with a lot of pillow-stuffing for a filter: no kidding: Jane had some. This arrangement is the pot-filter, with a piece of irrigation hose and a hose clamp shooting water out in an arc. We have pillow-stuffing functioning as a prefilter in the skimmer basket.
It’s a Rube Goldberg setup I have going, but I hope it will be better by morning.
I could not believe how murky the pond had gotten since I saw it last — just a few days ago. And it was getting really murky then! Today, the fish were barely visible in what is now primordial soup, and not moving much — just clustered together and quiet in the deepest portion. But they did eat, and looked good, when enticed w/ pellets.
And that pillow-batting improvised pre-filter? We must have hosed 5# of green-brown gunk from it, along with another 5# from the “real” filter. Amazing!
I’m glad you seem to be winning the battle. There’s a certain MacGyver-ish feel about all of this…
The pillow stuffing added to the skimmer basket and a paintbucket pot filter with sprinkler-buried-hose-type-stuff, rocks and more pillow-stuffing definitely are. 🙂 As Jane says in her blog, Necessity is a Mother.
we have had 36 – 38 degrees in Spain all week, and 2″ of extra water into the swimming pond with its phosphate load from the water tanker, so I imagine it will be a bit murky. the steps and the plank that you can sit on underwater get very slimy too if the chemistry is a bit off. I just hope the plants are doing their job and cleaning the water. and that the clients didn’t mind. your pond sounds awful – what a job!
How about a fish cam?
I don’t think that’s in the cards this year. But who knows?
after reading about all this fun with ponds, i think i’ll stick with the cats and dog 😉
IT’s a learnng curve. I’ve never managed an open air body of water without chlorine in it. I’ll get the hang of it.