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NanaJoyce

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Anyone interested in backyard ponds and streams. My husband and I recently completed making a 11' x 12' pond and a stream next to it. We have koi and goldfish. It's' hot here in San Antonio, TX and I never use to be outside, now I'm out hours and hours and loving every bit of it.

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Koi question

I have surfed the web to try to find an answer to this question and had no luck. So, I hope someone here has the answer. I have recently noticed that the koi in my pond have been hanging out at the surface of the water. They seem to do it mostly during the time that the sun is on the pond (the pond only gets about 4 hours of direct sunlight/day. So, at first, I thought they were sunbathing. :-) But, I have never heard of a fish sunbathing before! My pond is equipped with a biological filter that I run 24/7. I also have a waterfall which, I'm sure, delivers oxygen to the water constantly. They don't seem to be gulping for air, so I don't think lack of oxygen is the problem. And, they otherwise, appear to be very healthy. I test the water on a regular basis, and all of the levels are within normal range. What's odd is that another pond enthusiast whom I work with asked me the other day if my fish were hanging out at the surface of the water. !!! He, too, had never noticed this behavior before. I want to add that last spring my pond was "blessed" with lots of baby koi! I lost a lot of them, but still have quite a few. So, I know right now I have too many koi for the size of my pond. (which brings me to another question of how to find homes for all of my babies!?!?) My co-worker has the same situation. Could this be the reason for the behavior? Again...they don't seem to be stressed or unhealthy or gulping for air. Anyone have any clues? Thanks!

Beth

posted by LivinLovinCA

4 replies - last reply

Doesn't seem to be much activity here

and that's as much my fault as anyone else's, as I haven't been here for quite a while, although I still certainly enjoy my pond. So, while I'm here I might as well stir the waters up a bit. Can anyone identify this reptilian creature that I've spotted in my pond?

Photobucket - Video and Image Hosting

posted by Cincyjim

3 replies - last reply

small water pond

Hi everyone, I have a problem and hope someone can help me. I used a large horse trough and dropped it into the ground.I used bricks to make a ledge for plants. This was three yrs. ago and now have algae,mud,leech worms,and lord knows what else I have in there. I have a fountain I was using but it keeps getting clogged up and now that it is spring,do I empty the whole thing or what? I need help...

posted by Notime

1 reply - last reply

Too Much Water

Good morning to all. I just found and joined this group. I live in Washington state near the coast so you can imagine I get lots of rain. I have a beautiful semi-secluded 5 acres in the country. I love it except I am trying to landscape the side yard along a slight slope. The problem is that in this area I have a natural spring that floods my yard in the winter months. And here winter rains usually last about 5 months. I have given some thought to incorporating the spring into a water feature instead of digging yet another deeper drain line. Any ideas on the subject?

posted by nwhiker

Any Ideals

Iam in a new place,with a tall deck.thinking of maybe something cascading off the side deck into a bigger pond.
can anyone relate to what am thinking or have some Ideals of how I could build it up.am sure the pump would have to flow from the top.just wondering about some ideals.water flowing over rocks maybe into a fish pond.like a trail
how would you build in and it be strong enough.hope I make sense.

posted by jean7

1 reply - last reply

Who has blanket algae?

Hi, glad to see this group here. My husband and I dug and built a small pond (10x6 ft) a couple of years ago. Last year we were invaded by blanket algae. I have tried to keep it at bay by using fish and plant friendly algaecide (at least it seems to be plant and fish friendly so far), but during the winter it still grows and this spring completely engulfed all my potted water-lillies so much that I chopped off only a few small shoots and re-potted them and threw the rest of the waterlillies in the compost. I have a small waterfall going continuously (except in the winter) and it even grows on the rocks there, too. This stuff is nasty! Any suggestions? I live in the greater Chicago suburbs, so it gets cold here during the winter!

posted by glassgallm

3 replies - last reply

Frogs

Does anyone else have an invasion of frogs this spring? Normally we get them moving into the pond in the middle of summer, and they tend to all die off (or disappear somewhere) over the winter, but this year there were at least a dozen of them right away. Our winter was colder than normal, so I can't figure it out. There don't even seem to be very many insects yet for them eat. Any clues?

posted by bluebarn

Saying hello

New member saying hello here! New to water ponding also. Husband and I built a small 10x5 pond with waterfall last summer. Working on permanent landscaping around it this summer. Currently have 2 koi, 2 goldfish, and 8 bullfrogs living there. Evicted a copperhead last year. Looking forward to seeing photos of your ponds!

posted by boomom

2 replies - last reply

Forgot ... algae

glassgallm - we installed a UV light in our filter and have had great success controlling algae. Good luck!

posted by boomom

1 reply - last reply

Spring Cleaning

Just so I can tease and brag a little, we finished the annual pond spring cleaning chore last weekend. Seems like this is the year for waterfall rocks to collapse. I'm not so sure ours didn't have some help from some of the neighborhood kids, but be that as it may, that was the motivation to get on this task a bit earlier than customary this year.

We now have a clean pond, water as clear as it will ever be, a new waterfall design, fertilized waterlillies and water iris and an opportunity to "lord it over" the rest of you for a couple of weeks. :-)

Happy Springtime and pond cleaning.

(I keep threatening to buy a gross of 4 ounce cut-crystal jars to use for bottling spring cleaning pond muck and then reselling it as VERY exclusive beauty mud mask at some fancy cosmetic shop. I absolutely guarantee it will remove excess oil from the skin! Maybe I could buy some new pond sculptures?) ;-)