Some background to help understand my goal... My current setup is two pre-formed pond liners. The larger one is about 200gal and has a waterfall spout at one end which pours into the smaller pond of about 75gal. The larger pond has the grown fish... comets, shubunkins, and two very large koi who are desperately pleading for a bigger space. The smaller pond is mostly stocked with rosey reds (the feeder minnows).
The advantage of this setup is that, because of the waterfall, any goldfish which hatch out are swept over the falls and grow up in the lower pond. This gives them a fighting chance, so the big fish don't eat all of them. I generally end up with about 4 survivors by the next Spring, which then grow large enough to move up to the bigger pond.
I have a new pond in planning, with the larger pond being around 1000gal, then a short (about 10') river, dumping into a final small pond (probably re-use the 75-gal liner for this part). My plan is to keep the river fairly shallow, and place rocks or plants at the river head to prevent the really large fish from entering the river portion. Ideally, this would still allow any baby fish to be swept out of the large pond and into the smaller one. What I am hoping is that as the babies grow, they will be drawn to swim up the river and settle into the larger/deeper pond when they are big enough to not be eaten.
For reference, I plan on pumping this pond with a pair of Laguna 2900gph submersibles. This should create a pretty decent flow rate through the river, which will be around 12" x 6" deep. My understanding is that both the roseys and loaches like the moving water, and I think it will give me a nice combination of environments between different parts of the pond.
So my questions, after all of this... Does my reasoning sound plausible for having a natural way of letting the babies have their own 'private' section? Would the babies actually try swimming upstream as they grow larger? Has anyone else attempted or observed a separation affect with a river between ponds -- If so, could you please tell me your observations of the fish behavior?
Thanks!
The advantage of this setup is that, because of the waterfall, any goldfish which hatch out are swept over the falls and grow up in the lower pond. This gives them a fighting chance, so the big fish don't eat all of them. I generally end up with about 4 survivors by the next Spring, which then grow large enough to move up to the bigger pond.
I have a new pond in planning, with the larger pond being around 1000gal, then a short (about 10') river, dumping into a final small pond (probably re-use the 75-gal liner for this part). My plan is to keep the river fairly shallow, and place rocks or plants at the river head to prevent the really large fish from entering the river portion. Ideally, this would still allow any baby fish to be swept out of the large pond and into the smaller one. What I am hoping is that as the babies grow, they will be drawn to swim up the river and settle into the larger/deeper pond when they are big enough to not be eaten.
For reference, I plan on pumping this pond with a pair of Laguna 2900gph submersibles. This should create a pretty decent flow rate through the river, which will be around 12" x 6" deep. My understanding is that both the roseys and loaches like the moving water, and I think it will give me a nice combination of environments between different parts of the pond.
So my questions, after all of this... Does my reasoning sound plausible for having a natural way of letting the babies have their own 'private' section? Would the babies actually try swimming upstream as they grow larger? Has anyone else attempted or observed a separation affect with a river between ponds -- If so, could you please tell me your observations of the fish behavior?
Thanks!
