Going for it! phase one 12,000 gallon pond.

[GBBUDD]

This is where you say be careful what you ask for the storm has turned into a nor'Easter

 

[addy1]

I'm interested in the placement in your bog. The water is right below the gravel in mine, so would have no water to aerate? I just turned off the pump and drained the lines, water dropped to just below the gravel....hoping everything makes it next Spring.

Mine is always that way over winter, turned off, water drops to just below the gravel, evaporation factor and some drainage. In the early spring it grows back to the point I do a early purge of growing plants.
Yours will be fine. If the bog dries up totally that would kill the plants they would dry out.
Even with it being off for months the water never stinks i.e. stagnant when turned back on in the spring.

 

[Lisak1]

Plus there are fish living down there

That's hilarious! I have always wondered if we could possibly have fry make it into our rain exchange - or eggs make it down there and then hatch. Haven't found one yet, but anything is possible!

 

[addy1]

That's hilarious! I have always wondered if we could possibly have fry make it into our rain exchange - or eggs make it down there and then hatch. Haven't found one yet, but anything is possible!

I get fish in my fishless ponds all of the time, they go through the pump, down the garden hose feed, down a small water fall and turn the fishless pond into a pond with fish. I even get them up in my deck ponds, they go through a clear water pump, up 50ish feet of piping down a waterfall into the pond. They either travel as eggs or small fry, no clue really. My guess would be eggs but pure guess.

I have 6 fish in my lotus tub pond, they did the garden hose travel into the first pond then over a small water fall to end up in the lotus tub pond.

I just leave them be, they survive the heron, the winters , no water movement all winter and some good freezes.

 

[GBBUDD]

I get fish in my fishless ponds all of the time, they go through the pump, down the garden hose feed, down a small water fall and turn the fishless pond into a pond with fish. I even get them up in my deck ponds, they go through a clear water pump, up 50ish feet of piping down a waterfall into the pond. They either travel as eggs or small fry, no clue really. My guess would be eggs but pure guess.

I have 6 fish in my lotus tub pond, they did the garden hose travel into the first pond then over a small water fall to end up in the lotus tub pond.

I just leave them be, they survive the heron, the winters , no water movement all winter and some good freezes.

I have a new weapon against the over population of the pond from fry it's an all natural solution . A King Fisher has found my pond I don't believe they will go for a fish over 4" a koi that's 4" i could be wrong but that's ok even my babies from last year are now over 6" long I do have two babies from this years breeding that are pretty cool one is silver and black very uniformly marked but is a short fin . Another is a long fin and i mean real long as it's just a baby and it's tail is as long as the body if not more but he is a dark brown "time will tell if they can survive the Arial bombardment of the king fisher"

 

[addy1]

I would let the heron help with population, but after it wiped out one entire pond of fish, the other one 3/4 of the fish I keep the net on.
The big pond the fish have more of a chance. The heron would probably take all the bright fish and leave the dark ones!

 

[GBBUDD]

Love the look of the pond in the winter, i sure blows away a pool with a cover

 

[j.w]

@GBBUDD are you using 2 accounts, just wondering as noticed the difference.

Would be nice to not have to have a net but the critters around here would wipe all the fish out fast! They can also injure the bigger fish just stabbing at them even if they can't lift them out.

 

[Jhn]

Have used the heron around my pond for population control as well as the terrapins in my pond for the longest time. However, I drew the line when a hawk decided turtles were on its menu. So now I have a wide weave net stretched up high above the pond since this summer.

Will add some turtles back to the large pond this coming summer as the juvenile turtles will be 3 years old by then and fairly large.

 

[GBBUDD]

I got locked out of my account way back i was on differant pc's and i couldn't remember the password for the life of me and said the hell with it after an hour or so and just made gbbudd2 well i am on that pc now and now it remebers GBBUDD2 and i cant remember the password to gbbud2 now so life sucks and now im gbbudd and gbbudd just depends what pc i am on. definately not trying to pull a fast one considering i used 2 i thought fewer folks would ever even notice besides who else would ever want to be a gbbudd. i made this name over 20 years ago for an aquarium web site and now i just use it because some of the folks from back then have seen me here i thought i would be good to carry the name on even if no one even myself knows what a gbbudd is . I was new to computers then and i had little clue what a screen name really meant.

Have used the heron around my pond for population control as well as the terrapins in my pond for the longest time. However, I drew the line when a hawk decided turtles were on its menu. So now I have a wide weave net stretched up high above the pond since this summer.

Will add some turtles back to the large pond this coming summer as the juvenile turtles will be 3 years old by then and fairly large.

I have to closed in the top of the pond as yet so far so good i think the flight path is too tight for the heron and i have the net closing off the back yard if they were to try to walk in. even the ospree i have seen fly over head and hover only to fly away if they dove into the pond between the wire at 16 feet on two sides the house on another and the garage it leves little flight path horizontaaly for them to fly away.

 

[j.w]

@GBBUDD and @Gbbudd2 well if it's ever a slow day here and you have no one to talk to you can talk to yourselves

 

[GBBUDD]

Today is the two year Anniversary of breaking ground on the pond. I had an opportunity to start accumulating a lot of rock but I had no idea if a pond was even possible due to ledge sticking out of the ground less than 8 feet away from where my main bog was to be located. So I rented a mini excavator the day before X Mass and started digging. To my surprise I was able to dig down 8 feet and game on. Now I had ideas of what I wanted to do but I had not done enough homework on who what and where There's several things i would have changed like not digging in December as mother nature collapsed the sides of the excavation over the next couple of months with freezing and thawing. While I wanted a 8 foot deep pond more of a rec pond I am really glad I did not. The 5'-6" depth I ended up with is enough of a challenge vacuuming leaves up off the bottom of the pond. a 8 foot depth would require scuba or at least a snorkel floating at the top and controlling the vac from there. now some may be saying we vac are pool that's 10 feet deep whats the big deal. The pond has no smooth bottom or sides it's all rock and speaking of such i recommend especially on the deepest part of the pond that you use only 1 to 2" rock as the smallest you should use. A flattened nozzle can be used to suck up the leaves and not suck up the rocks INTO the vac hose yes they may get sucked to the end but they can be knocked off and not have to break down the hose. Over all after two years now I am very happy with how it is coming along but like everyone I wish I had made it bigger. I still have plans to install a rain water capturing system, and the main bog and stream may get some revamping. Once i get the pond streams and bogs to where i am content i will install the permanent fence instead of the orange construction fence. Though i may just use the netting that i have on one end of the pond already . because in this phone the 12 foot high net is stretched across the back of the pond and as you can see it is not all that visible and i can open it when ever i like and when it's closed so far no Great blue herons.
Merry Xmass and Happy Holidays to all

 

[GBBUDD]

I took Jw's advice with the above post and taking to myself

 

[j.w]

@GBBUDD and @Gbbudd2, enjoy your chatting time together

 

[addy1]

He had a real nice chat with himself!