Lights

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They don't actually look like that, that is a 3 second exposure, they're no where near that bright in person. The only light that hits the house is a little bit of a ripple, it doesn't illuminate the entire house the way it appears to in the image.
 
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Ok I kind of wondered about that, the pictures sure make them look intense.
The only lighting my pond has right now is a spot light shinning down from above, and both my wife and I feel it's a little too bright as well, great for seeing what's going on or doing things out there, but not really the ambient type of lighting we really want on all the time around the pond area. My wife has been bugging be to get some kind of alternate lighting for the pond, possibly underwater lighting, so I'm interested in seeing what others have set up.
 

brandonsdad02

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I'll try to get some pictures of my pond tonight. I have 4 strings of underwater lights. 2 are LED and 2 are halogen. Mine were sorta bright at first, but now have a nice coating of algae growing on them. I have discovered that night pictures don't turn out the best for me yet. I'm still working on that. It seems that my camera never captures everything that I see when it comes to night pictures.
 
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buckry, I tried lights in the water when I first set up my pond. They were always getting knocked over and also covered with algae. Now I use a couple low voltage lights with a timer on the perimeter of the pond that point towards the water. I have one directed towards the waterfall and one points across the pond and lights up the floating plants and some of the surface of the water. Even though I can't really see the fish at night very well, these lights light up the pond nicely and we can see it from our house. Also they attract bugs so my fish always have the midnight food buffet open if they are hungry!
 
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Also they attract bugs so my fish always have the midnight food buffet open if they are hungry!
So sometimes your fish aren't hungry?

Actually a light for attracting bugs down to the pond level is one thing I have been concidering. My frogs are always wandering around at night looking for bugs, but the bugs that get attracted to our spot light are way out of reach for the frogs. Placing a bright light close to the waters edge might help them out.
 
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Well, let's be fair here guys, I don't think koi or frogs need any help catching bugs. I mean, it's like helping polar bears stay warm by starting a bunch of fires at the north pole.
 
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I'm being fair Buck.
Our frogs, and we could have up to seven of them, are locked within the confines of my pond and courtyard area. If they relied only on what bugs happen to walk, crawl or fly into the pond area some of them are gona starve. There's just not enough to go around. The fish and turtles can eat just about anything, but frogs need live bugs. This is why I try my best to suppliment them worms, which are the easiest insects for me to get plenty of. Even so some some of the frog's hip bones are showing, which is a sign they aren't getting enough food. That and the fact these skinny guys wander more the the fat satisfied frogs, which are happy to sit and wait for something to come to them.
This need to wander has given us a daily morning chore we try not to forget. Every morning we have to search the courtyard area for frogs. The way our pond is built it is higher that the courtyard floor, and the frogs can easily just down to the floor, but they can't get back up. They like to wander at night, so as long as we check first thing in the morning, catching them and placing them back in the pond, we usually don't have to worry about stepping on them during the day.
Anyway, if I could find a way to bring more insects to my pond at night (in the pond area), maybe they would be a little less incline to hop down into the courtyard floor, and that would be one less chore we would have to worry about.
 

j.w

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Road kill Mucky..............that's the ticket.............just hang it over your wall and wait...................PLENTY OF FOOD FOR ALL THE FROGS :LOL:
 
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It sounds as if your backyard, and maybe even your entire country are very different than mine. I was outside sleeping on my hammock this afternoon, and I was harrased by no less than 6 different bugs.

At night, it's 3 times as bad, if I put in a light to concentrate all of those bugs somewhere, I'd have morbidily obese frogs, 7 pound bastards that would capsize my lily pads.
 
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Don't encourage me with ideas like that JW, I can see it now, a dead dog carcass hanging over the pond with fresh yummy maggots dropping down to the hungry frogs below. It would make a great photo, I could probably win July photo of the month with a picture like that. :p
 

brandonsdad02

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Buckry.

You would then get sued by some group saying that because the frogs were fat they were miserable and had a horrible life. You have a good point tho about the light close to the water for bugs. I have a bunch of bees that my frogs love to feast on. I think there is a hive near by that the bees come to drink
 
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It sounds as if your backyard, and maybe even your entire country are very different than mine. I was outside sleeping on my hammock this afternoon, and I was harrased by no less than 6 different bugs. Well we can't all be as fortunate as that. ;)
Actually if the mosquitos around here were a little bigger I'd have some obese frogs too, but they just aren't big enough for my frogs to take an interest in.

At night, it's 3 times as bad, if I put in a light to concentrate all of those bugs somewhere, I'd have morbidily obese frogs, 7 pound bastards that would capsize my lily pads.
 
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All of the hyacinths at the shallow end of my pond are swaming in bees. They never come to the deep end for some reason, and conversely, the frogs always hang out at the deep end. However, the leopard frogs I have are pretty small, I don't know if they can handle a honeybee, would be an epic battle for sure.
 

brandonsdad02

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As promised, here are a few pics of the lights in and around my pond. They are big, but I like it.


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