Basically new pond, all fish dead!

[Cshannon3]

On 4/31/19, I drained my approximately 1400 gallon fish pond. The pond has a rubber lining a pump and filtration via 2 pads and a bag of those balls that are supposed to assist in growing beneficial bacteria. I also have a waterfall, a small fountain, and 2 aerator balls to provide some circulation. I added water lettuce, hyacinth and 2 lilies for shade and oxygenation. I introduced 8 new fish, to join my 2 others, the following day.

My pond was beautiful until 2-3 days ago, when I noticed it starting to darken. I have tried all natural products to clear the water. I have now lost all of my fish. All were floating this morning. Very upsetting. I would like to fix whatever has gone wrong, and reintroduce fish. What might anyone suggest? I feel horrible that I let these fish die. 2 survived a full year, through the winter here in Tennessee, and are now gone. Any help appreciated!

 

[MajorDan]

Wondering why you drained the pond of all the good stuff that keeps a pond healthy. Did you have a leak? Seems you will have to start over now to get your pond to cycle. But, I am a newbie so hopefully more experienced ponders will jump in.

 

[Cshannon3]

I am also new to this. The pond was here 2 Decembers ago when we purchased the house. Nothing had been done to it in 10 years according to neighbors. We had it cleaned, a new liner installed and started to use it again. Not know I shouln't, I drained the pond due to the amount of crap in the bottom. I did have a leaf net over the pond for the fall and winter, but plenty still got through. I transferred the 2 fish to temporary housing until I could replace them, the following day. Apparently, that was not long enough? It took nearly 3 weeks for this to happen, and the fish seemed very happy and healthy. Hopefully I can get some answers here. Thanks for your response.

 

[kaarl]

Sad to hear that. What species of fish? Goldfish can survive very low oxygen levels (in cool weather) Domestic koi need quite high oxygen levels. Once I killed some of my koi by not aerating the pond well and letting organic matter decay at the bottom because of a clogged bottom drain. (I now pump air through the hole that was the bottom drain and that doesn't happen anymore!) The most deadly accident was filling the pond almost entirely with chloramine-treated city water and not adding the chloramine remover soon enough, only one koi survived that, but all the goldfish survived.... In my experience the fish don't mind cloudy or green water, they just need oxygen and a little food. One of my koi and all my goldfish are about 15 years old.

 

[Faebinder]

Basic questions:

1- Did you add enough water dechlorinator… are you sure it was the right quantity?

2- What is the total number of fish you had in the pond? I presume they are all goldfish. Are they big koi?

3- What size of a pond is your filter designed for?

More than likely what happened is that the ammonia and nitrites levels spiked up from the large addition of the fish and the filtration could not build the bacteria fast enough for the big load. It's better to introduce fish at the rate of 1 fish per week to that size of a pond IMO. Also your filtration may be suboptimal for that load of fish.

 

[Lisak1]

Welcome @Cshannon3 - sorry that it's a pond disaster that brought you to the GPF. Let's see what we can help you figure out.

Since the pond was emptied and refilled three weeks ago and the fish were fine up until a few days ago, it seems safe to assume the problem was not chlorine in the water. When you say you "tried all the natural products to clear the water" can you be more specific? What products did you try, did you use more than one thing at a time, and how much did you add? When you say the water "darkened" was it like pea soup? Or dark like a cup of tea?

What did you observe about the fish before they died? A bit more info will be helpful.

 

[Cshannon3]

The fish were Shubunkin and Comets. I have been fortunate to find one, and it is now in a new environment, until I figure out what to do next. The photo in my post is of the pond this morning. Wednesday, the pond was perfectly clear. I used some liquid Barley Extract, properly measured for my volume, and a product called Pond Shock. The pond shock is a ball of beneficial bacteria that has always maintained the clarity of the water. Yesterday, the fish(9), were gathered at the surface, and breathing on the surface. Hopefully this information helps garner some answers. Thank you all!

 

[kaarl]

Was the water city water or well water?

 

[Cshannon3]

City water, but carefully measured dechlorinator used, 3 weeks ago.

 

[kaarl]

Our water company uses *chloramine* not *chlorine* There are some products that remove chlorine but not chloramine, but generally anything that removes chloramine will also remove chlorine. Anyway since the fish survived in the new water for three weeks, the city water treatment wouldn't be the problem. Don't know, sounds like plenty of water for 8 or 10 goldfish. Goldfish are really hard to kill, in my experience. Maybe there was some sort of ammonia buildup? Any chance some pesticides or lawn fertilizer drained into the pond???

 

[kaarl]

Something called Pond Shock sounds rather suspicious to me..... <8|

 

[bettasngoldfish]

If you added new fish without first doing a quarantine that could be the reason for fish loss. They may have introduced something to your other fish that made them all sick.

 

[Faebinder]

The fish were Shubunkin and Comets. I have been fortunate to find one, and it is now in a new environment, until I figure out what to do next. The photo in my post is of the pond this morning. Wednesday, the pond was perfectly clear. I used some liquid Barley Extract, properly measured for my volume, and a product called Pond Shock. The pond shock is a ball of beneficial bacteria that has always maintained the clarity of the water. Yesterday, the fish(9), were gathered at the surface, and breathing on the surface. Hopefully this information helps garner some answers. Thank you all!

Barely inhibits algaes growth. Algae is what changes ammonia to nitrites. By pausing algae from growing to consume the ammonia and introducing new fish that adds more ammonia, an ammonia spike probably happened.

 

[Somethin' Fishy]

I'm so sorry to hear about your troubles and loss of your fish. Based on what you've told us, I wonder if some sort of toxin got into your pond... Fertilizers, or pesticides that could have washed in? Has the county or highway department come through to spray for mosquitoes, weed killer, etc.? (I live a short distance from you in the next county, and the herbicide sprayers were just through here last week... Our yard is marked as a no-spray zone.)

The only other thing I can think of is that your new fish may have had something wrong with them... Where did you get them? Aquanooga or Petco/Petsmart/etc.?

 

[Sparky]

Sorry for the bump in the road. Sounds like you might have knocked out most of your BB with the cleaning, what was left was able to sustain the two, then added 3 times more bioload and blam. Cleaning knocked it out of balance hence the water changes. My opinion of course.