I do not think my pond is deep enough!

[leet13]

callingcolleen1- Great pic! The lighting is really awesome! wow, those are some big fishies!

addy1- I have no idea where to start when its time getting them out. I assume I will need to remove my plants and try to corner them to one side with something. I hope I do not hurt them when I catch them.

 

[addy1]

callingcolleen1- Great pic! The lighting is really awesome! wow, those are some big fishies!

addy1- I have no idea where to start when its time getting them out. I assume I will need to remove my plants and try to corner them to one side with something. I hope I do not hurt them when I catch them.

The best thing you can do is drain the pond down, give them less water to run in. Do that first before you start trying to catch them. It helps to have two people working on it, (disclaimer hubby and I couldn't catch one lol but it had lots of water to run to) one to spook them into the net sitting quietly waiting for fish to swim into it.

Don't leave the pond dry, refill, then at the end of winter you will know how badly it freezes also better than leaving it dry.

 

[Fishylove]

Lol addy! those buggers are hard to catch, i resorted to using a flashlight at night, worked a bit better than in the daylight but not much! lol

 

[addy1]

Once they know you are trying they run - well swim and swim fast. You could try and block part of the pond so they can't go there. How easy it would be would depend on the shape of the pond.

 

[rebelangel_3733]

Last year I brought my fish kids indoors to our heated back porch...as my pond is only 18" deep (preformed). I drained the pond 3/4 of the way down and netted em so was way easier to catch em. We had a very mild winter last year here in Nebraska and possibly could of just left them out, but I know 18" is way to shallow just in case we get our bad winter.
This year I'll bring em in again (since I have more/bigger fish this year I'll have to get a larger tank of some kind). I just leave the bubbler run on them over the winter on the back porch and they do just fine.
Still at thought as to digging deeper and use a liner for my pond, just had absolutely no time this summer to do so. One of these years...I have 4 fancytails, one shubunkin and 3 goldfish (one who'se huge and 9 years old I got from someone who didn't want their b/y pond anymore).
I don't know where the summer went and dam sure don't want to think about winter yet! But alas, will have to start thinking bout it...darnit.

 

[koiguy1969]

take it from somebody who does it every year... i pump the water from outdoor pond into the basement pond. (thru the filter).. as the water level goes down so does the fishes ability to evade capture. yes you'll wanna move your plant pots out.but, this allows you to prune them, resolve any issues in potting, and you can split them while theyre out as well. i use a flotec pump in a 5 gallon bucket with holes drilled in it to prefilter the water. ..garden hose thru a basement window into the pond. when you do it this way your putting the fish into the same water they just came out of...same chemistry. same temp..this equals less stress. no acclimating, dechlorinating etc.. it also means theres active bacteria and enzimes in it. i also use the sme filter media in both pond filters. this insures i always have an actice bacterial colony in my filter. now your ponds empty you can clean it up as well.....refill it ...

 

[sissy]

I would pay to see addy try and catch a fry .

 

[addy1]

I would pay to see addy try and catch a fry .

lol sissy it is a crack up! and the fry usually wins.

 

[leet13]

GREAT!!! Now I know what I am doing when I need to move them. I am going out to test my water today and do some clean up. Been raining for the last 3 days and the water is looking cloudy.

 

[CometKeith]

Leet, I know you have already made your decision but a friend of mine had a 2 ft deep pond in Chicago for many years without a problem. Finally the liner cracked because the sun damaged it due to it being very shallow and exposed to harmful sun rays. if you decide next year to leave them out next winter it should be fine if you have some sort of air bubbler to keep a hole in the ice. If it gets bad by me like when we got 20 inches of snow I fill a kettle with hot water and sit it on the surface until it melts a hole. I actually feel spring is a lot more dangerous than winter for fish because of harmful bacteria that occurs when the fish have low resistance to disease. Maybe use the opportunity of bringing them in to go a little deeper with the pond so you can leave them out in the future.

 

[Jason]

I honestly never thought about how deep your pond is "Recommended" to be until i joined this site?! lol Mine is only 12'' (1ft) deep at it's deepest and 8'' at the shallowest part! I built the pond for looks first then put the Goldfish in. They been in for a month now and doing fine. The area is shaded but still allows sunlight through the trees and it only gets 30 degrees here in the winter. I would imagine the 3 lights i have in the bottom of the pond put off a small amount of heat but Im not worried about it. The water wont freeze because 1. it barely gets to freezing levels and 2. I push 850GPH through a 300Gal pond, so the water is constantly circulating.

 

[fishin4cars]

Jason, Here are some things to think about though. I live in Southern Louisiana, pretty similar weather. Shallow pond problems: easy for predators to catch your fish, tempature fluctuations, even though they may not freeze shallow ponds change temps faster, one cold snap and the temps in a shallow pond can change 20 or more degrees in a few hours, NOT GOOD! Also the heat can be worse than the cold. Goldfish are cold water species. a 1 foot deep pond can reach temps of 95 degrees if the outside temp is 98 or so all day. You do get that warm there huh? also, green algae love a pond that is shallow, warm, and has the nutrients to grow, you got all three if you have fish. that will always be something we will have to battle. Always take into consideration where you live. Those up north MUST consider winter issues, not so much a problem for us down south, We Must deal with heat. Different season, same solution. Deeper ponds simply work better than shallow ones.

 

[adavisus]

Shade through midday will moderate temps on a shallow pond in a hot climate, the l'il feesh will prefer seventies waters instead of pickling in 90's heat

Regards, andy
http://www.flickr.com/photos/21940871@N06/
http://swglist.wordpress.com/

 

[Dave 54]

we have a friend in Canada thhat thanx to us now brings her koi and goldfish indoors during the winter they suffer temperature of -24c and a wind chill of -54c brrr cold.
we decided she should take them indoors which it take them indoors so now she houses to ponds indoors ready to go back in the spring , this is after her asking what she could do to stop her koi diying in the spring ( it was that cold the gill filaments got fried by the frost and ice etc.
Last winter all her fish especially the koi came through intact
It had been that cold that the waterhad to be hacked open each day down to 2ft and the water from the air pump acctaually froze bubbles and all

Dave

 

[sissy]

I worry about this winter and wonder if it will be as bad as the 2010 winter .So now trying to think ahead .