50 Gallon Pond - 2 Weeks Water Quality SOS

[mmorris]

Hi Ethan, I am new to ponds but I have been keeping and breeding tropical fish for most of my life. A lot of people's water has carbon dioxide. When the water is drawn and exposed to air the carbon dioxide gasses off and the ph rises. To find out if this is the case for you, fill a bucket with water and put an air line from an air pump in the bucket. Check the ph straight out of the tap and then 24 hours later. If you find the ph rose, that is probably the reason. You will want to age your water before doing a water change if you have fish and your ph rose in the test. A ph of 8 is fine but I wouldn't be happy about fish and a ph of 9. The more you mess with water the more problems you will have. The only reason I can think of for the nitrite and ammonia spike is the bomb. It's possible the manufacturers added ammonia to the bottle to feed the bacteria. I don't know. You are only talking about 50 gallons here. I'd dump all the water out and start again without the bomb. Buy one little fish and let him kick start the nitrogen cycle. Bacteria will grow that eat the ammonia the fish gives off, turning it into nitrites. Another type of bacteria will grow that eats the nitrites and produce nitrates. Check ammonia, nitrites and nitrates regularly. When ammonia and nitrites read "0" and you are getting a reading for nitrates (preferably below 10ppm) then your tank is cycled. It will take a few weeks. Plants often go through a stress when they are moved to different conditions and they may have been struggling at the store. Be sure you are giving them enough light. If they are rotting throw them out. HTH
Martha

 

[mmorris]

Do you think daily 25 or 50% changes should do the trick?

If you don't already have fish just dump it all out and start again. When you have a fish (and I don't recommend more until the water is cycled), 50% every two or three days should do it for a few weeks. That's if you have one little fish. You need somewhere for the bacteria to grow. They don't grow in the water column. They normally grow in the filter media. Your filter media needs water flow through it all the time.

 

[Ethan1991]

If you don't already have fish just dump it all out and start again. When you have a fish (and I don't recommend more until the water is cycled), 50% every two or three days should do it for a few weeks. That's if you have one little fish. You need somewhere for the bacteria to grow. They don't grow in the water column. They normally grow in the filter media. Your filter media needs water flow through it all the time.

Thank you, you have really said what me and my partner was thinking

So, if I were to empty the pond, wash out the filter (Basically a reset) and add 1 goldfish... should that do the trick? I was thinking of keeping the hornwart in the pond as they're doing really well and oxygenate the water. What do you think?

 

[j.w]

I'd wait a few days after you do water change to add one fish if it were me. The fish will make the good bacteria come to your pond. Yep keep the Hornwort, plants won't hurt the pond, they will help unless they are rotting.

 

[mmorris]

If you do a complete "reset" you can go ahead and add a fish right away, provided you add something for chlorine (and chloramine, if you have it). Fish don't generally mind a high ph but they don't do well with ph swings. If the ph out of your tap is different from the ph 24 hours later by 0.3, you need to age your water. Go ahead and add the hornwart, but hornwart doesn't seem to like high ph's. By the way, how old are your test kits?

 

[Ethan1991]

If you do a complete "reset" you can go ahead and add a fish right away, provided you add something for chlorine (and chloramine, if you have it). Fish don't generally mind a high ph but they don't do well with ph swings. If the ph out of your tap is different from the ph 24 hours later by 0.3, you need to age your water. Go ahead and add the hornwart, but hornwart doesn't seem to like high ph's. By the way, how old are your test kits?

They’re recently purchased, about 2 weeks ago.

Thank you. I’m going to empty this weekend if the water hasn’t stabilised

 

[mmorris]

You are welcome! Good luck!

 

[Lisak1]

Don't get too discouraged - these small ponds can be much more difficult to balance than larger bodies of water. Small changes can really throw them into a tailspin. I'm not a big proponent of water changes - you're trying to get mature water in your pond. Every time you change it, you start over.

 

[mmorris]

Lisa, water's water. It's the bacteria that grow on surfaces that we want to encourage. Water changes are fine, provided the ph and temp are the same and chlorine has been removed. Overstocked ponds would benefit from a water change if the nitrates go above 10ppm or so. The only possible issue is changing a LOT of water in a tank that's fully cycled. The bacteria could take a hit because there is less ammonia and nitrites in the water for them to feed on. The amounts are too small for us to measure. The bacteria would bounce back in a matter of a few days though.

 

[Lisak1]

Lisa, water's water.

Sorry. We'll have to agree to disagree on that one. Aquarium water changes - absolutely. Eco-pond water changes - not necessary. Water changing, I believe, is an aquarium keeping convention that has drifted over to pond keeping and they just aren't the same thing. And I say eco-pond to separate the discussion from a dedicated koi pond, which is a whole other story. One key part of maintaining a healthy eco-pond is to keep the fish load low.

And I don't know about you, but my pond is currently about 80 degrees - how would I match that temperature from my garden hose? Or even pH for that matter? Saying it's fine if you can match the temperature and pH is basically saying "it's impossible". A 20% water change in my pond is 800 gallons - that's a heck of a lot of water to warm up.

In the end, I don't really care what others do. I just like to provide the "other side of the story" for those who are just starting out. If I had been told that I would have to dump and add 800 gallons of water to my pond every week or two I would have passed on the pond. Our water is REALLY expensive - that would have made owning a pond a pipe dream for me. This is 8 years without a water change speaking.

And let me just add - we have a patio pond as well (roughly 45 gallons). We don't change that water either. Lots of plants, a few small fish and it does great. Gets rain water when it rains or a top off when I'm watering and that's it.

 

[Tula]

I have no experience with aquariums. I do have experience with a pond, 15 years. I'm not a scientist, but I have read a lot over the years and learned by experience.

I fall somewhere in between regular water changes and no water changes ever. I "change" water every time I back wash my filter, but I'm not a big believer in huge water changes. For one thing I think it's a complete change ( shock if you will ) to the fish environment . Isn't leaving the water in the pond to "mature" the same concept as "aging the water?

 

[Lisak1]

Isn't leaving the water in the pond to "mature" the same concept as "aging the water?

Exactly. And I agree with you - I think water changes are stressful for fish. And when you remove water from the pond, you're losing other things besides just water - all those tiny microscopic critters that inhabit the pond are gonna get pumped out with the water. They are all part of the ecosystem and add to the health of the pond.

I occasionally will water plants out of the pond - it's great for the garden and my hanging baskets green up almost instantly when I use pond water. So then I may add some fresh water to the pond. But it never amounts to more than a few gallons at a time. Last night we got a half inch of rain - free pond fill up! - so there's more fresh water. But that's the extent of any "water changes" in my pond. Again, I just don't think you can apply aquarium keeping rules to pond keeping. Yes, it's water and fish, but that's where the similarities end.

And I'm not a scientist either - I just do lots of reading and thinking and reasoning things out in my own way. So take anything I say with that in mind!

 

[mmorris]

Sorry. We'll have to agree to disagree on that one.

No, we're not disagreeing. I don't think ponds should need water changes either. Like you, I think the fish stock should be kept low. However, if one is needed there's no harm in doing it, so long as the stats are the same and dechlorinator is used.

 

[mmorris]

. For one thing I think it's a complete change ( shock if you will ) to the fish environment . Isn't leaving the water in the pond to "mature" the same concept as "aging the water?

There's only a shock if the water stats (temp, ph, etc) are different. "Aging the water" usually refers to letting the water sit for 24 to 48 hours to gas off the carbon dioxide so the ph can stabilize.

 

[Jhn]

@mmorris, water isn’t just water when it comes to ponds. Aging/mature water in a pond isn’t just referring to off gassing CO2. In a mature eco-pond your water is full of plankton (zoo/phyto), insect larvae, aquatic insects, even various tiny shrimp species, too name just a few things that can be removed with water changes. The idea is to establish the base of a food web/chain, similar to what is found in nature. Also, in ponds water changes, usually come with I also scrubbed the liner and rocks clean in my pond. In which case, now your pond needs to cycle again and rebuild the beneficial periphyton/bacteria layer that was just scrubbed away. So, unless something toxic gets into a mature well balanced pond, causing fish die off or ammonia to spike, water changes are unnecessary and can be counter productive, if you don’t know what is in your source water.

Granted in the OP’s case, the pond is similar in size to a mid size aquarium, so it will need to be monitored a bit more than a larger body of water. If it were me I would leave it alone as the pond has started cycling, with the ammonia and nitrite reading. Why introduce a fish when there was already an ammonia source introduced somehow. 2 weeks isn’t that long for an aquarium/ pond to cycle, most the time it takes 4 weeks or more for the water to fully cycle. Patience as was mentioned is key, the bacteria population will grow enough eventually to bring the ammonia and nitrite readings to zero, if you give it time.