Goldfish dying in pond

[KB1ankenship]

So I doing the constant water change now, about a rate of .2 to .25 gallons an hour. Since I have added the Ammo Lock, I have only had one fish die on me, unfortunately it was one of my koi. The koi that died, I had for just under 30 days, so the pet store gave me my money back on it, but I was not happy to see it go.

Per the Ammo Lock label, I need to add it today, as the pond still shows ammonia when I test, but I was wondering if I need to add it since I am now doing the constant water change.

I have stopped adding the other chemicals, and hoping my pond will balance out.

 

[JohnHuff]

Sorry, haven't visited this thread for a while. Did you or were you going to put in a DIY filter?

 

[KB1ankenship]

Yes, I was still planning on the DIY filter. I still need to look at some plans and decide what will work best. For now, I am just doing the constant water change, and adding Ammo Lock every two days like the label says.

Another day without any fish deaths though.

 

[KB1ankenship]

I just went out and did a water test, and my ammonia looks like it is between 2 and 4 ppm. My color scale goes from 2 to 4, and the color I get looks a little darker than 2, but lighter than 4. My PH was at 7.5, my NO2 was at 0, and my PO3-4 was at 0.

Looks like everything is ok, except for the ammonia level.

 

[pecan]

Good luck KB, I hope you get it worked out. As you have heard many times, it really does seem like A LOT of fish for a small pond. You have more comets and koi than I do in my 5000-6000 gallon pond (I have 4 medium Koi, 13 medium Comets and about 24 baby Comets from last year).

From reading this thread it sounds like a catch 22. Too many fish causes too much fish waste to build up, raising amonia levels. So you are forced to change the water a lot to bring the amonia down, but the frequent water changes stress the fish. Either way you will have a hard time just maintaining the pond that size with that fish load.

Good luck and keep us posted.

 

[j.w]

Pecan the constant drip system would be good for the fish I would think as it wouldn't stress them out cuz not that much coming in but still keeping the water fresh w/ some new all the time.

 

[don't ask]

good luck kb, you're getting there

 

[crsublette]

My guess is your bio-filtration is too small if you still have to use such a huge amount, continuous dosage of Ammonia binder chemical.

Ya really need to look into the DIY section about the 55 gallon barrel bio-filtration. I bet this would solve your problems. Bio-filtration is the portion of the filter system where your bacteria colonies thrive.

From what I am told, the quality of filtration determines if a pond is overstocked with fish. Ya can have that many fish in the pond, but ya need to have an appropriately scaled bio-filtration.

hmmm, your KH test says it is high yet your pH is 7.5 ... something does not add up unless I am missing something. KH will determine how low your pH will reach. Your pH should be much higher if your KH is near 240. KH determines the low end of your pH. The more KH then the higher your low end of your pH will be. If your KH is near 240, then youre pH should be at least 8 or likely higher. This is the problem with paper strip test kits. If ya want a better determination of your KH level, then buy the API liquid KH test kit. Also, ya can easily contaminate pH liquid test kits if ya touch the inside of the test tube cap or touch the lips of the test tube. pH is lowered by nitric acids from the nitrification cycle and other types of acids consuming KH. As your pH lowers, so does your KH.

If ya are going to do water changes from your hard water source, then don't need to worry about KH since it will be constantly refreshed form your hard water source. Also, if your pH is high (that is far beyond 8.0), then you will need even more filtration to offset the increased ammonia toxicity created by a high pH.

If you really want to keep that many fish in your pond for many many years, then ya need to dig into the weeds, that is learn the more technical aspects of pond keeping. Otherwise, you will likely continue to lose fish until to the point your bio-filtration can keep ammonia levels stable. Fish can live for many years if ya properly tend to their environmental health.

Ya really need to look into the DIY section about the 55 gallon barrel bio-filtration. I bet this would solve your problems.

Remember also that bacteria colonies just don't "appear" all of a sudden. Takes time to grow appropriate. So ya likely will be using the Ammonia binder hardcore as ya have been. Once ya have your big bio-filtration setup, then slowly slack off the Ammonia binder to allow your bacteria colonies to get bigger and bigger and bigger hopefully to the point where ya do not need to waste anymore money on a heavy Ammonia binder chemical regiment.

 

[JohnHuff]

He only has a 150g pond, so a 55 gal barrel might be overkill!

 

[crsublette]

Seems like it might not be overkill if he wants to have that many fish in such a small pond. That is a huge load of fish for 150g pond. I think bio-filtration is matched according to fish load instead of the amount of gallons in the pond.

 

[JohnHuff]

I haven't been following this thread daily, but I thought most of his fish went to fish heaven...

 

[KB1ankenship]

Yes, unfortunatley, most of my fish have gone to the big pond in the sky. I have 3 koi, and about 10 - 15 goldfish right now, with 1 small sucker fish. I am going to keep working on it until the water is at a good place, and not add any more fish.

I was looking at the DIY section on 55 gallon drum filters, and I plan on adding one, once I figure it out. From what I have seen, it looks like I pump the water from the pond down to the bottom of the 55 gallon drum. I leave a space at the bottom for debris to collect, and use a grate to keep the filter media above that space. The water then filters up through the filter media, and then flows back into the pond. I saw people using everything from sponges, to scrub pads, to filter string stuff for filter media, but I am still not sure what I want to use.

I was thinking of doing something like the smaller filters I am using now, just larger scale. I put some bio-balls at the bottom of the drum, a few inches above those, leaving some space, put a filter grate type thing with a coarse filter media above that, then put a more foam type media above that, then have the water flow back into the pond.

If there are any opinions on what would be best to use for filter media, I would appreciate it.

 

[crsublette]

With 3 koi (assuming they get up to 8 inches long), 15 goldfish (assuming they get up to 5 inches long), and a sucker fish (assuming it gets to 5 inches long) ... totals to be 104 inches of fish for a 105 gallon pond. From what I have read, if you have 4 inches of fish per 10 gallons of water (that is 42 inches of fish in 105 gallons of water), then you need a good size bio-filter or a fancy bio-filter.

KB1, if your current fish load live and grow in a 105gallon pond, then you will potentially have at least 10 inches of fish per 10 gallons of water. However, I am told gold fish only grow according to their environment's health; so, they may not get that big. For 105 gallon pond with a small bio-filter, I am told the general rule of thumb is that ya should have ~21 inches of fish (or 3 fish that are 7 inches long) if ya do not want to use ammonia binder chemical and other stuffs.

The big constant slow water change that ya just setup will help a bunch. Very smart for choosing to do this with the high load of fish.

With the amount of fish you currently have in your pond and potentially have as they grow, I do not know what size of a bio-filter you would need since you are doing a good big constant slow water change, but I do know you need a bio-filter. Ya can never go too big if ya have a way to hide it to make it a less of an eye sore. I have read of folk putting cinder blocks around the barrel, fish the blocks with dirt, and then planting hanging type plants inside of the top cinder block; then, the plant will grow and drape down the side eventually hiding some of the blocks. Then ya could put small shrubs or rocks to hide the bottom of the barrel..

Yes, unfortunatley, most of my fish have gone to the big pond in the sky. I have 3 koi, and about 10 - 15 goldfish right now, with 1 small sucker fish. I am going to keep working on it until the water is at a good place, and not add any more fish.

Fish are awesome and Mother Nature is a horrible hag that tells us we can't have too many beatiful fish in our waters without consequences. :grumble:

I think you are smart for not wanting to add more fish and I think you are on the right track by looking at the DIY bio-filters and for implementing the constant water change system. From what I am told, the slow constant big water change, over a period of days, will not stress your fish out so much.

Remember, the DIY threads about the drum filters just give ya an idea of how everything is constructed. The filter can be adjusted to any size container. There are 33 gallon drums and 5 gallon buckets and various sized flat bottom trash cans and stocktanks you can use as the container for a bio-filter.

 

[JohnHuff]

With 3 koi (assuming they get up to 8 inches long), 15 goldfish (assuming they get up to 5 inches long), and a sucker fish (assuming it gets to 5 inches long) ... totals to be 104 inches of fish for a 105 gallon pond. From what I have read, if you have 4 inches of fish per 10 gallons of water (that is 42 inches of fish in 105 gallons of water), then you need a good size bio-filter or a fancy bio-filter.

Now that you mention it, I've been using the figure of 1 inch per 13 gallons for my pond which I've read on the internet in a couple of places. So your 150g pond would have a capacity of 11.5" of fish! Like most of us, you'll probably want to expand your pond!

 

[Waterbug]

Google "strawberry pot trickle tower". Trickle Tower filters are 10 to 30 times better at converting ammonia and nitrite than the 55 gal drum submerged filters. These submerged media filters are a very old concept in filtering. Better choices have been developed since then. And the TT designs are way easier to build and pretty much self cleaning (which is one reason why they work so much better.

An even better ammonia/nitrite converter is a Shower filter. These can be too noisy for some people, but in a small setup maybe not too bad. Google "planter bakki shower pond filter" for a bunch of cheap and easy DIY solutions.


Inches of fish per gallon may be a nice rule of thumb, but it's meaningless in practice. The amount of food being fed is way more important. 100" of fish being fed once a week vs 100" of fish on an auto feeder being fed 8-12 times per day...way different. Also the type of filter makes a huge difference. The inches rules came about many years ago when bio filters were pretty crappy, and I could understand the correlation. If you have a crappy bio filter then you're relying 100% on the pond surface to provide ammonia/nitrite conversion, so it made sense to limit fish to a pond's size. But we have way better bio filters today.

It's starting to becoming a big problem on the internet...old information. Use modern information or be needlessly stuck with the same problems people had 10-20 years ago.