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- Dec 22, 2015
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Hi,
Ive had my pond set up and working now for over a year. I started by planting lots of grasses and assorted pond plants like lily pads and also added several rock hideouts to give my fish a chance at surviving the florida heat and avoiding predators (which so far are very few fortunately) I live in north central part of florida so the pond appears to have become a very balanced eco system so far. I started by putting some comets, and a few fancy goldfish, a few algae eaters and a pregnant molley. Of course before spring was over, I had lots of Molley fry as they are live bearers and easier to survive in the pond, but eventually ended up with over 50 fish, mostly comets maybe a few shabukins.
It was fun seeing nature take over and do its thing, and now have snails, toads and other tree frogs using it as a breeding ground, but did not think through the plants and had put some elephant ear and cattails which ended up being very invasive to the point where my 50 plus fish in my 8 x12 x 2.5 deep pond could hardly have room to move around.
So now knowing what I've learned. I've cleared out all the invasive plants, but left the grasses even though they too can spread quick, but it seems to have made for an awesome egg layng habitat for my fish, who also became a little to over-populated. So I sold off whatever fish I could and donated my less popular fish to my local pet shop.
Now I would like to try my hand at breeding Orandas. Particularly pandas and red n black, which seem to be in popular demand right now and hard to find sometimes. I kept my two adult Orandas solid orange and a gold with white wen. And also have a young red cap in the pond. But after my first purchase of my juvenile pandas and black n reds, that I had released to grow up in the pond, I did not realize that I still had one young bullfrog (released last spring as a tadpole) in my pond, who helped himself to all but 4 panda babies. and I'm still trying to catch him and have him removed to another area.
My pond water quality is of course much improved and I've purchased some assorted less invasive plants, but have an issue with ick on my adult Orandas at the moment, probably due to all the plant removing and stirring up the pond debris earlier this fall, while trying to catch and remove all my off breeds. Im sure it stressed them out even though I cleaned the filter several times and flushed my pond out directly after the disruptions that made my pond very murky several times for at least 8 hours before I could get it settled down and clear again.
I just tested my water after adding the medications to help remove the ick issue. And all looks good right now. Another hard lesson learned was overfeeding of course. Now I have them on a good assorted balanced food and light feeding schedule, so Im hoping that maybe this natural way of breeding Orandas will be successful. They all do seem to be happy in their pond, have never had a fish die that I know of (none that I ever saw) I did however find a dead mouse while clearing out my plants though yuck!
If there are others out there using a natural pond for breeding fancy goldfish, could you please respond with you're experiences? As i would love to succeed at doing this using a natural pond setting. I know Orandas are more delicate and I'm a little concerned about our occasional cold weather we get. (below freezing at times for brief periods. But they say they can tolerate a pretty good drop in temps (just no feeding or certain types of light feeding in winter) and to simply run a slow dripping hose to provide warmer underground water during the hard freezes. I have bought 6 more panda and red n blacks which I'm keeping in 55 gallon growing bins with heat and a ATI filter in each, hopefully to allow them to get big enough by spring to safely add them to the pond without being eaten by my bullfrog (in case I dont catch him).
My next dilemma is to have to sell off my two adult gold colored Orandas, and probably my red cap so i can successfully keep just the two colorations that I want to breed. Then figuring out how to put a divider of some sort in the pond to keep the two colors separate. (I'm thinking a light small holed net with weight on the bottom and floatation on the top} Has any one ever tried this before? I have a few months to decide still, but would love some input on this. Just love my Orandas! Thanks for reading and any advice on these matters.
mitzi56
Ive had my pond set up and working now for over a year. I started by planting lots of grasses and assorted pond plants like lily pads and also added several rock hideouts to give my fish a chance at surviving the florida heat and avoiding predators (which so far are very few fortunately) I live in north central part of florida so the pond appears to have become a very balanced eco system so far. I started by putting some comets, and a few fancy goldfish, a few algae eaters and a pregnant molley. Of course before spring was over, I had lots of Molley fry as they are live bearers and easier to survive in the pond, but eventually ended up with over 50 fish, mostly comets maybe a few shabukins.
It was fun seeing nature take over and do its thing, and now have snails, toads and other tree frogs using it as a breeding ground, but did not think through the plants and had put some elephant ear and cattails which ended up being very invasive to the point where my 50 plus fish in my 8 x12 x 2.5 deep pond could hardly have room to move around.
So now knowing what I've learned. I've cleared out all the invasive plants, but left the grasses even though they too can spread quick, but it seems to have made for an awesome egg layng habitat for my fish, who also became a little to over-populated. So I sold off whatever fish I could and donated my less popular fish to my local pet shop.
Now I would like to try my hand at breeding Orandas. Particularly pandas and red n black, which seem to be in popular demand right now and hard to find sometimes. I kept my two adult Orandas solid orange and a gold with white wen. And also have a young red cap in the pond. But after my first purchase of my juvenile pandas and black n reds, that I had released to grow up in the pond, I did not realize that I still had one young bullfrog (released last spring as a tadpole) in my pond, who helped himself to all but 4 panda babies. and I'm still trying to catch him and have him removed to another area.
My pond water quality is of course much improved and I've purchased some assorted less invasive plants, but have an issue with ick on my adult Orandas at the moment, probably due to all the plant removing and stirring up the pond debris earlier this fall, while trying to catch and remove all my off breeds. Im sure it stressed them out even though I cleaned the filter several times and flushed my pond out directly after the disruptions that made my pond very murky several times for at least 8 hours before I could get it settled down and clear again.
I just tested my water after adding the medications to help remove the ick issue. And all looks good right now. Another hard lesson learned was overfeeding of course. Now I have them on a good assorted balanced food and light feeding schedule, so Im hoping that maybe this natural way of breeding Orandas will be successful. They all do seem to be happy in their pond, have never had a fish die that I know of (none that I ever saw) I did however find a dead mouse while clearing out my plants though yuck!
If there are others out there using a natural pond for breeding fancy goldfish, could you please respond with you're experiences? As i would love to succeed at doing this using a natural pond setting. I know Orandas are more delicate and I'm a little concerned about our occasional cold weather we get. (below freezing at times for brief periods. But they say they can tolerate a pretty good drop in temps (just no feeding or certain types of light feeding in winter) and to simply run a slow dripping hose to provide warmer underground water during the hard freezes. I have bought 6 more panda and red n blacks which I'm keeping in 55 gallon growing bins with heat and a ATI filter in each, hopefully to allow them to get big enough by spring to safely add them to the pond without being eaten by my bullfrog (in case I dont catch him).
My next dilemma is to have to sell off my two adult gold colored Orandas, and probably my red cap so i can successfully keep just the two colorations that I want to breed. Then figuring out how to put a divider of some sort in the pond to keep the two colors separate. (I'm thinking a light small holed net with weight on the bottom and floatation on the top} Has any one ever tried this before? I have a few months to decide still, but would love some input on this. Just love my Orandas! Thanks for reading and any advice on these matters.
mitzi56
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