My favorite pond books

pond links

Hoop houses

My pups

Shop eBay at my wife's store...Hank's Toy Chest Express

"This is True" daily archive

My pond is more a formal type. It is 6' x 10' and 2' deep, edged with square exposed aggregate flagstones. I've had it for about 14 years now. Currently just a few goldfish. Pic doesn't show egyptian papyrus that is taking over, but I plan to remove that this summer soon as I figure a way to get the bugger out of the pond. Probably have to cut it up in situ.

I learn a lot by visiting the rec.ponds newsgroup. Some mistakes I've made include not cleaning the pond for about 4 years, and letting my lilies outgrow the pots in the process. I had detritus 8" thick on the bottom. The other mistake was putting a plant shelf all the way around the pond. Lost a lot of volume that way and harder to clean. A lot of pond books recommend plant shelves, but you sacrifice volume. Better to raise the plants on milk crates, bricks or concrete blocks and gain the volume

Can't fix the plant shelf for now, but did clean the pond and divide the lilies. Had tubers 2" thick and 4' long in there!

Since I cleaned it (probably 6 cubic feet of roots and muck) and put my pump down in a bucket of gravel with the discharge going to a rubbermaid container set up as an aerobic filter, the water is very clear. I have a lot of lilies and pickerel plant with anarchis and parrots feather. The pond has never been pea soup green. Last year I had a lot of string algae, but have none this year.

These are my goldfish buddies being fed. They don't seem to grow fast, probably because I have too many for this size pond. Also, I don't feed them that much, just enough to give my water hyacinths survival chances. Saw the whole mess of them just ragging on the roots the other day. It is still surviving though. As you can see, the water is pretty clear.

I added one of those 18" plastic balls to the smaller pond. It sits on a plastic pedestal and looks like a bubble of water sitting on the pond. I feed my fish in the bubble so they all get stacked up inside it for a while. Only downside is I have to clean it every couple of weeks because it grows algae. I learned if I add clorox to the ball (after out of the pond, of course) when I clean it, the algae just wipes off. No clorox and you scrape and scrape. I don't mind cleaning it since I get to see my fish better. It's about the only real way to see the minnows, they dart around so fast (not that minnows are all THAT attractive, but, hey, they're mine). In winter the fish sometimes go up in the ball as a source of warmer water when the sun shines. You can look for it on the web by doing a search for add-a-sphere.

This is a smaller bubble I got from Pondbubble.com, but that link quit working. Another source to see one is available here. I like it better because it cost 1/5 as much,~$30 (runs closer to $50, now). No pedestal, easy to install, easy to clean and lightweight. The ball in the paragraph above is light until you put water in it. Then you aren't going to lift it too high! As you can see from the pic, feeding time is easy. I'm not the greatest digital photographer. The pondbubble website has several MUCH better pics! If you are interested in this one be informed that it is basically floating on the surface. You sluice water out the edges to get it to float. It may not be for everyone (what is with ponds?). One person reported a large koi got in the channel around the bubble and almost died. Another said when the bubble sank, which it will if it gets under a waterfall or you have alot of rain, it trapped a fish on the bottom. I use it where it can't get filled (except by rain), and can't sink far (lots of plants in a goldfish pond), so I like it. One site I visited which had turtles suggested putting it in occassionaly and not leaving it (to avoid trapping a turtle!)

My second pond was a 10' x 12' x 2' lily pond. I framed it with 2" x 6" lumber since the ground wasn't level and poured a concrete support shelf for the edging rocks. I used Permalon on this one. I like it and will use it on the NEXT pond which will be bigger still (of course) and below the pool. This pond was in the shade of a tree so I am having trouble getting the lilies to do well. I planted some in gravel and they never seemed to get started so I repotted them in play sand. Seems strange since the lilies in my first pond that jumped the pot grow like big dogs in the pond. I started with five fish (2 orandas, 1 shubukin, and 2 koi) and had over a dozen. That's just the ones I can see! I added a 100 gal. stock tank filter system similar to the one described on the pond links page by Skippystuff, except I added a second light grid above the filter media and LOTS of plants in the filter, all either in small mesh pots with gravel or free floaters. I had a green heron snacking for a while but the one pond is now completely covered by plants and the other about 60% so I think the lack of visibility helps save my fish.