- Joined
- Sep 14, 2013
- Messages
- 6,218
- Reaction score
- 4,975
- Location
- Cincinnati, Ohio
- Hardiness Zone
- 6 A
- Country
17 is the final count ! It helped that one of my females spawned on a floating plant bag last Spring and I was able to remove it from the pond. Next year I'm going to work on creating DIY spawning mats either out of yarn or just use cotton mop heads, since it seems to really reduce the number of fry.
We started draining the pond at 8:15 while it was cool outside. We ended up draining the entire pond and moving my 4 adults into the 125 gallon livestock tank. We filled the tank with pond water , ran an aerator and had a mesh net secured with 8 wood clamps.
Man, they are big and strong ! I first thought I could guide them into a pillow case I'd cut open...thinking it would be safer for their scales. This didn't work out, so I guided them into an oblong deep pool net and secured the opening with the wet pillow case. I tried to calm them by doing it slowly and I held them secured to my chest, supporting them from underneath. Reversing this process was more difficult as the live stock take is much smaller and I was worried about spooking the others and having them jump. I think I need a better net, like a koi sock net.....perhaps Santa will bring me one !
Catching the babies was so easy with the pond nearly emptied! There was one baby that was so beautiful I was temped to keep it. It looked like it could be a Gin Rin Ochiba, just lovely. I was relieved the owner of the plant nursery with the private pond / lake agreed to let me release them there, as I didn't want to do Craiglist with covid. Their pond/ lake is fairly large, however it is getting taken over with lotus plants ! I found an area with a big plume of hornwort and that's where I released them
I could not have done this without hubby's help, it was a big job and we're both exhausted ! We swapped out aerators for the season, took down the hoops and the wide weave netting and put up the mesh Autumn net. We laid it over the boards we use for the winter structure ( pool solar cover ) so it'll be easier to prep for winter.
Whew, I'm ready for a hot bubble bath and early bed time!
We started draining the pond at 8:15 while it was cool outside. We ended up draining the entire pond and moving my 4 adults into the 125 gallon livestock tank. We filled the tank with pond water , ran an aerator and had a mesh net secured with 8 wood clamps.
Man, they are big and strong ! I first thought I could guide them into a pillow case I'd cut open...thinking it would be safer for their scales. This didn't work out, so I guided them into an oblong deep pool net and secured the opening with the wet pillow case. I tried to calm them by doing it slowly and I held them secured to my chest, supporting them from underneath. Reversing this process was more difficult as the live stock take is much smaller and I was worried about spooking the others and having them jump. I think I need a better net, like a koi sock net.....perhaps Santa will bring me one !
Catching the babies was so easy with the pond nearly emptied! There was one baby that was so beautiful I was temped to keep it. It looked like it could be a Gin Rin Ochiba, just lovely. I was relieved the owner of the plant nursery with the private pond / lake agreed to let me release them there, as I didn't want to do Craiglist with covid. Their pond/ lake is fairly large, however it is getting taken over with lotus plants ! I found an area with a big plume of hornwort and that's where I released them
I could not have done this without hubby's help, it was a big job and we're both exhausted ! We swapped out aerators for the season, took down the hoops and the wide weave netting and put up the mesh Autumn net. We laid it over the boards we use for the winter structure ( pool solar cover ) so it'll be easier to prep for winter.
Whew, I'm ready for a hot bubble bath and early bed time!
