Gas will find an opening without a gap, but the gap would offer more surfacea area for oxygen.
Another winter cover thread
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We are 6b ish, still have plants flowering..........waiting for the big cold hit! been around 27 or so.
stroppy
stroppy
freezing here arctic weather minus 2 celsius thats about 28 fahrenheit and been snowing all day !!!! pond sitting at about 5 celsius some parts of the Uk have temps of minus 18 celsius ...lowest temps ever recorded here for november
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stroppy said:
burrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr
we are at 56 right now But we did have snow by this time last year.
digginponds
pondaholic
I totally AGREE.oldmarine said:
I mean with a heater to allow air exchange a pond that ice's over actually holds in the heat.And as long as you keep the water moving it will never freeze solid PERIOD.I get a kick out of watching my fish swimming under the ice.
Cover's seem to either be a waste or a pain.Allow nature to take it's course. imho
oldmarine
Married 32 years
I had gold fish incapsulated in ice for most of one winter many years ago. It was a cement above ground pond approx. 6' X 3' X 1.5'. When I had checked on the pond after a real bad freeze I noticed that the fish were incapsulated in the center of the ice in a pocket of unfrozen water in the shape of an egg about 1.5' long. I couldn't see if the fish were dead, but I left them alone assuming they might be dead. Later that month when the weather warmed up enough for the ice to melt. I noticed that the fish were alive and doing well. After all, they are carp.
digginponds
pondaholic
oldmarine - funny you say that.back in the 60's as a kid,I took a goldfish and put it in the freezer,later that day my mom put it back in my tank,asking me ,why did you do that.My answer was........I'm experimenting, oh and yes the goldie did live after thawing out.
oldmarine
Married 32 years
The proof is in the pudding. Not sure if one would want to do that with a koi. You know how delicate they are.
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oldmarine said:
That is why I am sticking with goldies, shubunkins............lol, don't have time for delicate fish!
oldmarine
Married 32 years
addy1, I'm with you. I only have shubunkin's in my 365 gallon pond simply because they won't out grow my pond. Of course my dream is to have a large pond one day in my yard.
There are a lot of nice goldies out there if you can get the stores to let you pick from the feeders, they are cheap.
oldmarine
Married 32 years
DrDave, I could n't agree more. All of the shubunkin's that I picked up real cheap were rather plain when I brought them home. Now they all have brite colors like Koi, but of course aren't Koi.
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The petsmart here lets you pick them out. The one employee went into the back and picked through their big tank for nice colored ones for me. The one shubunkin I have has a tri tail and the one goldie is orange and white. Will see if they are around in the spring. They have one big pond to themselves!
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Petsmart doesn't even call them feeders, just small ($.13) and medium ($.27) goldfish. And every fish person I've seen in the stores is really happy to pick out pretty pets for you rather than see them go as food. I have 9 beautiful, healthy commons and comets from the $.13 tanks. If you get them when they first come in they are mostly nice and healthy. After a few days of extreme overcrowding, they start to die off.
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I'm a goldfish guy too, half comets and half shubunkins. I have tried the feeder route and I disagree. Unless you are going to quarantine them first you are risking getting the rest of your fish sick. Those cute little 13 cent fish may look okay but are in a tank with a lot of sick fish and may be carrying disease. If you talk to their employees they say not to worry about it, but they are totally wrong. I have bought the $1.99 shubunkins at Petsmart and had great results with them. They have outgrown fish in my pond that were triple their size and some of them have beautiful colors.