Minnows & frogs

[donny young]

I opted out of koi & goldfish last year. My grandkids caught minnows and put them in my pond. Then two frogs showed up. Does anyone have minnows as opposed to koi and know of any pros and cons?

 

[kelpie]

I'm heading towards keeping minnows and sticklebacks. I've read nothing that concerns me about keeping minnows in my wildlife pond..

 

[addy1]

I opted out of koi & goldfish last year. My grandkids caught minnows and put them in my pond. Then two frogs showed up. Does anyone have minnows as opposed to koi and know of any pros and cons?

Minnows easy, not fussy about water. Can keep in a smaller body of water.
Goldfish a spawn a lot, drop a lot of babies, but not to fussy about water
Koi dump a ton of eggs, fussy about water, need a lot of water and filtration. IE a big pond

 

[donny young]

I'm heading towards keeping minnows and sticklebacks. I've read nothing that concerns me about keeping minnows in my wildlife pond..

the water stays way cleaner than it did when i had goldfish. i wonder how long they live and how big they could get. my pond is only 220 gallons.

 

[kelpie]

the water stays way cleaner than it did when i had goldfish. i wonder how long they live and how big they could get. my pond is only 220 gallons.

have a google of keeping minnows. Firstly it depends on the type of minnow... iirc, can be up to 10 years with some types, the other bit i remember was that a hungry minnow will eat anything! oh and you'll need to have some kind of filter to take out the ammonia they create

 

[GBBUDD]

Minnows for the most part can be found in just about every fresh water lake and steam. They are very hardy for the most part

 

[gimpy]

I have what is referred to as rosy red minnows. They are very small, very hardy fish. They are feeder fish that I bought at Pet Smart for about 16 cents each almost two years ago. My pond is very small and shallow (about a foot deep at its deepest, kind of circular about 6 feet in diameter, no living plants—I’ve tried). Probably less than 100 gallons? As adults they reach 2-3 inches in length. They hide most of the time, but occasionally come out. I think they are fairly short lived, 3 years or so? I seldom feed them because they seem to ignore every thing I give them (flake, pellets, frozen brine shrimp).

I would throw 7 or 8 in there and forget about them. My little pond was empty of fish so I didn’t worry about isolating them for a week or two. I do live in zone 6b, I think. I don’t have anything else in there with them. Last summer the adults I had did give 3 or 4 spawns (kept getting little babies a lot of the summer)

 

[Lisak1]

At 220 gallons there is NO WAY you should consider koi, so that was a good choice. Even goldfish would need to be kept to a low number. Minnows seems to be a great choice!

 

[donny young]

At 220 gallons there is NO WAY you should consider koi, so that was a good choice. Even goldfish would need to be kept to a low number. Minnows seems to be a great choice!

Yes I had goldfish for a few years. They were a ton of work. The minnows are relatively hassle free. Thanks for your feedback

 

[ShawnInfirmity]

The minnows may breed, but they should not be too much to handle. The rosy red's that I have had in the past lived about three years on average and they can actually get around three inches long when fully grown.

 

[donny young]

The minnows may breed, but they should not be too much to handle. The rosy red's that I have had in the past lived about three years on average and they can actually get around three inches long when fully grown.

thank you shawn, the minnows survived the winter and so did the frogs. its finally warm up here and there's a lot of activity going down