Newbie with Many Questions

[lisa202]

Hi Koikeeper,
Well, we finished our pond. (oh my aching back...rocks are heavy) We took your advise and put goldfish in...4 shunbunkins, 4 comets, 4 sarassa and 6 tadpoles. The fish seem very happy and come up to see us when we go and look in. They are very active and love to hide under the floating island. A lot of dirt got in while we were configuring the waterfall, so we keep vacuuming and are waiting for the filters to do their jobs. We also just put in this beneficial bacteria stuff to help.
Thanks again!
Lisa
ps. when we put in the lily pad plant, we used a terra cotta strawberry pot underneath to bring the plant up to 5 inches below the top and now the fish can swim in and out (for now, until they get bigger) It worked out great (I really didn't want to use a milk crate)

 

[lisa202]

sorry...the pictures didn't work. I'll try again

 

[koikeepr]

Lisa, I am so glad to hear your endeavors worked out well! Congrats on the build. Now you can enjoy the pond.

With regard to the clay pot, just make sure to take it out and store it in your garage in the early fall, as clay will freeze and crack in cold temps. Also, give it a check every now and again, as even tho fired and hardened, it is clay. You just want to make sure that being in water long term isn't softening it up somehow.

That sounds like a great combo of fish and will certainly provide you with color and variety. Goldfish like this are a lively bunch, and they can still get pretty big.

Keep working on getting the dirt out as best you can. If you can move very slowly, you can actually use a dust pan and a broom to pick stuff up. I have a cheap broom that I bought in the dollar store that I use only for the pond (I have it labeled so none of the geniuses in my household try to use it to sweep the house floor). You can use this broom to push the dirt into a small pile and then either scoop it in a net or a small dustpan. Just move really slowly when you have it on the dustpan until you have it outta the water. You may get things a little cloudy, but that will clear up after a few hours.

Please do post photos. I'm eager to see how it all turned out!

 

[lisa202]

Hi, I can't seem to upload the pictures. I click on the paper clip and follow the instructions, but I keep getting an error message..something about a security token missing. when I try to contact admin with the problem, that message keeps saying that the page is missing. What should I do?

 

[koikeepr]

Hmmmm.

I'm not familiar with the paperclip method to be able to help with that one.

What I do is upload my photos to a free photo sharing site such as www.photobucket.com and then I just link 'em to the GPF site by clicking on the photo icon here above the message box. Then you just cut and paste the location of the photo.

Not sure if others have other methods they want to share.

 

[lisa202]

It's hard to get the dirt out since it's 30" down. We've tried to scoop it out with something really slowly, but you just can't see what you're doing, or breath when you can reach that far down.

I'm still trying to put the photos up. I tried photo bucket, and while I have them on there, I can't seem to get them over here. It must be me...I've been trying to do this for a while now and nothing seems to work.

 

[koikeepr]

ok. When you open one of your photos in photobucket, copy the address that's in your address bar up on top and PM me that address. I'll see if I can do something with that.

 

[koikeepr]

 

[lisa202]

It seems that you found them. I'm not sure what happened since I didn't get a change to do that "little code" thing yet. But...thanks!

 

[koikeepr]

I think it looks great! Very natural. The rocks tucked into that little cove with the moss lend a real authenticity to the pond and you would swear that it's a true blue natural spring fed pond. Also a very good job on the waterfall and also on overhanging the rocks around the inner rim--there is no trace of a liner. Bravo!

The fish definitely look happy and you've got great color in there. You can see those sarassa's do look like kohaku koi. I'm so glad you went with goldies for this pond--koi would have definitely been too large. The goldfish just fit in perfectly in this watergarden setting.

Kudos to you!

 

[lisa202]

Thanks so much! All the moss is what we shaved off from the ground, except where the water meets the rocks...that is sheet moss I bought. You just cut it and wet it and tuck it in. It's pretty sturdy and takes a beating. I know that I'll probably have to replace it sometime in the future, but it's relatively cheap. It's like spanish moss where it's not dead...but not alive?? Anyway, it came in handy.

Again, thanks for all your advice. I really love the goldfish!
Good night.
Lisa

 

[Ian]

Hi, I can't seem to upload the pictures. I click on the paper clip and follow the instructions, but I keep getting an error message..something about a security token missing. when I try to contact admin with the problem, that message keeps saying that the page is missing. What should I do?

I'll have a look in to this problem for you now, but in the meantime it looks like koikeepr has found them :fish:.