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I don't know about the small tank minnow gender, but I put 20 minnows in my big outside pond and within a few month the number had grown to 1000.
I don't feed the outdoor pond, and the minnow population has hovered around 1000 ever since. (no string algae ever in the outdoor pond, either
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Changing the subject now, heh?
! have had a small 33 gallon tank set up for 10 months now with no water circulation or filtration, all I do is replace top up water, prune plant growth and feed the fish. It has not turned into a stagnant wasteland.
I don't feed the outdoor pond, and the minnow population has hovered around 1000 ever since. (no string algae ever in the outdoor pond, either
I was relaying my similar experiences with the proliferation of the minnows ...
ok, I think I know what you are saying. i grew up with a small fresh water pond, maybe a couple hundred gallons. No filters, so skimmers, no aerators, no fountains, but it was a fresh in and out pond. It had a constant intake and outake of water at a low rate. It never developed a string algae problem. It had about 3" of nasty goop on the bottom always and we never fed the big goldfish that lived in it. It was only about 18" deep (in the south). Sometimes we treated the fish with bread or a worm but nothing more then that. It was a perfect ecosystem and even with no plants in it, it was completely maintaince free. Our dogs (labs), laid in yo get cool, our ducks raised their chicks in it. Just a very lucky condition, i guess.I see a lot of people saying that our ponds are not natural, but nature is everywhere.
Whatever we set up outside or inside will develop the appropriate bacteria and algae populations over time.
Problems develop when we think our ponds are 1 way streets for all the stuff we put in them. What we put in, we must take out.
I have had a small 33 gallon tank set up for 10 months now with no water circulation or filtration, all I do is replace top up water, prune plant growth and feed the fish. It has not turned into a stagnant wasteland.
There are 3 ruby red minnows in it, a few plants and algae and a garden soil substrate.
Correct, the mere existence of a soil substrate in ponds does not "entail the pond being a stinking cesspool of H2S".
As long as the soil substrate never becomes too deep and is not significantly disturbed nor accumulates alot of organic matter... then everything will be good for your fish...
http://visibleearth.nasa.gov/view.php?id=69045
"The hydrogen sulfide gas periodically bubbles up from the ocean bottom, and when it encounters more oxygen-rich water near the surface, a chemical reaction occurs that transforms the sulfide gas into pure sulfur. In the first stages of the reaction, the sulfur appears white, and in this image creates a milky-green green tinge to the water. When the transformation is more complete, the plume will look very green.a mixture of the yellow sulfur and blue water.
Ironically, the region’s high productivity is also one of its greatest threats, since the hydrogen sulfide gas resulting from such an explosion of life and its inevitable decay is highly toxic to the fish and other marine animals that feed off the phytoplankton. Periodic die-offs of whole populations of fish and other commercial seafood are ongoing concerns for the regional fishing industry."
