Too many fish

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new to the forum, so will share what i have. i made a pond last summer, its been up and running almost a year. pond itself has done great. 10 foot diameter poly stock tank setup above ground. 1000 gph filter and aerators running 24/7. water lillies, iris's and horsetail rush as well as plenty of underwater plants. pond is around 1100 gallons. i put in 12 simple goldfish last summer shortly after startup figuring i would lose half of them. i lost 2 not a bad thing but now i find myself with 10 5 to 6" fish and well they are reproducing. i havea few questions and i know everyone has to deal with this.

1 how do i catch the little ones with as little stress as possible to my big ones and 2 what do i do with them after i catch them? also is there a way to slow down the reproduction or eliminate the fry while they are smaller?

a couple of pics of the finished pond.

thanks for the help.
 

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I love your pond, really neat !

The only way I'm successful in catching fry is by lowering the water and netting them. There are several members here who have made a home made trap @mrsclem , and some have used minnow traps.

I've read that eliminating pond plant reduces spawning, but I love pond plants ! Various members have done different things with the off spring, most people try to give them away to friends or post on Craigslist. We have a nursery near by with a pretty large outdoor pond that lets me release them there.
 

j.w

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@BigRay Very nice looking pond! I've never had to catch fry as my goldfish eat the eggs now way before they get a chance to hatch. I'd stop feeding your fish and let them devour the eggs. Too late for you now tho as they have hatched. If they are very tiny fry still you could put a netted ring in there where they can get through but the big fish cannot and feed the little ones in there and then they will grow and won't be able to get out. I think they may naturally go into the floating netted ring as they did when I had one in there once w/plants in it. I took that ring out as I did not want a ton of babies surviving in my pond.
I made this out of pond tubing and fiberglass screen door material sold in hardware stores in a roll. Sew it on w/fish line.
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new to the forum, so will share what i have. i made a pond last summer, its been up and running almost a year. pond itself has done great. 10 foot diameter poly stock tank setup above ground. 1000 gph filter and aerators running 24/7. water lillies, iris's and horsetail rush as well as plenty of underwater plants. pond is around 1100 gallons. i put in 12 simple goldfish last summer shortly after startup figuring i would lose half of them. i lost 2 not a bad thing but now i find myself with 10 5 to 6" fish and well they are reproducing. i havea few questions and i know everyone has to deal with this.

1 how do i catch the little ones with as little stress as possible to my big ones and 2 what do i do with them after i catch them? also is there a way to slow down the reproduction or eliminate the fry while they are smaller?

a couple of pics of the finished pond.

thanks for the help.
looks very cool . a customer of mine built similar but they used it as a hot tub . no liner it was more like a large wine barrel very cool look. I like your choice of woods
 

addy1

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also is there a way to slow down the reproduction or eliminate the fry while they are smaller?
I don't feed the fish, they inhale the spawn. Not many babies survive and I have a lot of plants. A forest of hornwort.
 
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I love your pond, really neat !

The only way I'm successful in catching fry is by lowering the water and netting them. There are several members here who have made a home made trap @mrsclem , and some have used minnow traps.

I've read that eliminating pond plant reduces spawning, but I love pond plants ! Various members have done different things with the off spring, most people try to give them away to friends or post on Craigslist. We have a nursery near by with a pretty large outdoor pond that lets me release them there.

thanks all for the comments. i don't think i realized that once you add fish to your pond, you add a headache, lol. i actually enjoy feeding my fish and caring for the pond. it was work to cut all of the cedar fence pickets to make the enclosure but i didn't want to see the ugly grey tank and it made a great place to contain the filter and electrical. i guess its time to get to work and get these buggers out of the pond. by the way they are somewhere between an 1" and 2" now. i also have a pond full of plants including hornwort that has taken over also what i wanted. the pond has done great and turned out exactly as i wanted it to. once i figure out the fry issue i think i will be good.

has anyone tried to introduce a predator fish? i think i read somewhere someone had put in a bluegill to control the fry, was wondering if it would harass the bigger goldfish.
 

j.w

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A pet store may take those goldfish from you to sell or you can put an ad on Craigslist for free fish. Lots of people have ponds and would like to have them.
 
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Blue gills , bass trout all fine with larger koi i would not put put a bass in with gold fish. now a blue gill would be fine with gold fish i am leaning toward on blue gill myself but I was waiting until now. Making damn sure i didn't add one with eggs. Where i stoped feeding the koi the amount of babies has dropped there seems to be only a dozen that survived.
 
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Blue gills , bass trout all fine with larger koi i would not put put a bass in with gold fish. now a blue gill would be fine with gold fish i am leaning toward on blue gill myself but I was waiting until now. Making damn sure i didn't add one with eggs. Where i stoped feeding the koi the amount of babies has dropped there seems to be only a dozen that survived.
i guess i was wondering if the bluegill would harass my main goldfish. although at this moment they would be almost as big as a bluegill. they are about 5" long right now. thinking of the bluegill and looking to add a bog filter to the setup.
 

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