My goldfish pond

[CometKeith]

CE, It's over now. Well at least my pond looks pretty with the snow all around it and the water nice and clear. It's really a beautiful December scene. Thanks JW. yup I saw some fish and then poof... they are gone!

 

[CometKeith]

Well we had a few warmer days. I dont know why it's alway cold on the weekend when I'm off but my fish seem to like the warm days during the week. So most the fish look very good and i haven't identified any fatalities with fish or frogs as of yet. It looks like some of the fish grew over the winter. I have a larger red goldfish with long fins that is just sitting flat on a raised shelf. Twice I thought she was dead and when i nudged her with my net and both times she swam away. The other day i saw a fairly large black fish that was swimming near the top and today I didn't see it. It's middle portion was really fat and it look like it might have swallowed a pingpong ball. I don't know if it was a pregnant female but it seems to be a little too earlier for that. I saw a small fish flashing and hope it will be okay but none of the other fish were doing it. Everybody else looked good and I saw a few tiny babies that were born last year. It's been so cold I haven't done any water changes. Usually by this time I have done a bunch already. I still have a lot of leaves in the pond and need to get them cleaned up and the water is a nice burnt orange color from all the leaf tannins. Eventually that will all clear up when I do my water changes. Overall the water quality doesn't look bad and the smell is good. I think it was helped a lot by keeping my pump to the waterfall running all winter.

 

[addy1]

Keith, I had around 4-5 fish I though were dead, laying on the bottom swimming when I went to scoop them out. (water was around 39-40 ice had just melted) As it warmed to 40-42 those fish started swimming like normal and are totally fine.
They must have disliked the cold.

 

[CometKeith]

Addy, It's still laying on the bottom and doesn't look too good. The rest of the fish look fine. I even saw my frog. He grew a lot since last year. Speaking of frogs.I was wondering how yours are doing?

 

[addy1]

It took almost two weeks for the flat laying fish to start swimming, they are all fine now, one tiny one died.

Frogs, pulled out around 6 dead ones. around 5 dead over wintering tads. But toads, green frogs, overwinter tads are all swimming around and looking good. Lots of frog noise in the back yard.

The frogs were in the small fish-less ponds, they froze solid, the frogs could not handle it. One small pond that froze solid I did find two living goldfish, and two dead frogs.

Over all not too bad considering how the ponds froze up. The 300 gallon lotus stock tank did freeze to the bottom, waiting to see if the lotus make it.

All the lilies are growing back.

 

[CometKeith]

Sorry about your frogs. My one green frog has grown a lot. I can't believe how big he got. I need to find him/her a companion! I keep doing water changes to get my water to turn from brown to clear. ...slowly it's getting better. I still have not installed my biofilter because overall its been too cold.

 

[addy1]

I have lots Keith, the resident deck pond green frog, saw it yesterday, not sure where it was for the winter. Found two in one of the stream ponds. I need to get them running, starting to algae up, but good for all the toad eggs, frogs, snails, dragon fly larvae etc. There are a few in the pond but they duck real fast under water. lol.

I see some jumping into the small preforms, but they move quick right now so hard to spot.

 

[CometKeith]

Glad to hear they are okay.Well you know how much I like green frogs......I finally found out what happened to my missing green frog from last year. I talked to one of my neighbors today and a different neighbor had a frog in their window well. Well he "rescued" it and brought across the street to the golf course pond. He didn't know that I have a pond and that it was probably my frog!!

 

[Meyer Jordan]

Glad to hear they are okay.Well you know how much I like green frogs......I finally found out what happened to my missing green frog from last year. I talked to one of my neighbors today and a different neighbor had a frog in their window well. Well he "rescued" it and brought across the street to the golf course pond. He didn't know that I have a pond and that it was probably my frog!!

And considering all of the pesticides and herbicides that golf courses use, that poor frog didn't stand a chance.

 

[CometKeith]

Yeah, Everytime they spray for mosquitoes around us all the little baby tadpoles I am trying to raise die the next day. I have read on line about the stuff they spray how non toxic it is blah, blah, blah but it still kills them. I can't imagine it is too good for us humans either.

 

[Meyer Jordan]

Yeah, Everytime they spray for mosquitoes around us all the little baby tadpoles I am trying to raise die the next day. I have read on line about the stuff they spray how non toxic it is blah, blah, blah but it still kills them. I can't imagine it is too good for us humans either.

Don't let them fool you. They are probably spraying some solution of permethrin which is toxic to just about everything. I have a customer (decorative water features only) that has a automatic mosquito spray system with nozzles placed in various locations in her yard. Not only does she not have mosquitoes, she does not have anything else including birds, butterflys, squirrels....her yard is devoid of life.
The county that I live in ceased spraying for mosquitoes years ago once it was brought to light that they were doing more harm than good.
And yes, it will kill your fish...very quickly!

 

[CometKeith]

Meyer, I agree. You are preaching to the choir here. Someone in our family was diagnosed with Lymphoma a few years back. Who knows what caused it but I am not a big fan of any kind of chemical spray....

 

[CometKeith]

Well my larger red sarasa comet finally went to fishy heaven today. She has been laying on the bottom since the start of spring. I think she was my 2nd oldest fish having got her from Petsmart 5 or 6 years ago. She had a really pretty long tail.

 

[addy1]

Darn sorry to hear.

 

[RobAmy]

Very sorry