Hi from Montana!

[j.w]

I remember when younger when bats were flying around people would say watch out for your hair, those bats will get in there and get all tangled up and bite you all up. Must have been in the era when girls had those big poofy ratted up hairdo's and it looked like a nice place for them to make nests :biggrin:

 

[addy1]

I never had thick enough hair to poof it.............fine baby hair

 

[j.w]

No worry for you from bats roosting on your head then addy. My hair is thick but pretty straight and usually wore it long so no worry for me either. Bring on the bats

 

[Big Lou]

Back my early days the chimney on the old school house in Calvert was home to bats. During that same time period most all ladies had poofy and bee hive hair styles.

 

[gardengirl]

Well I guess my my hair was poofy when I would go get paper early in the morning! lol

 

[mtpond]

Found one of my koi floating in the pond Saturday morning . The fish had no apparent signs on the outside of having any issues. Tested the water and all was ok. So I decided to turn on my air pump thinking maybe low oxygen. Did a water change yesterday and so far no more dead fish.

 

[sissy]

sorry to hear aboat your fish and heat and plants using up oxygen at night will cause the lose in the morning so good you turned on the air pump .

 

[callingcolleen1]

I took the big sweet flag out of the bottom pond last week and hacked it back as it was taking up half the pond, and looking like it was going to "smother my pond". The fish in the bottom pond we not swimming as fast as they should be for this time of the year, so I knew to start hacking some of the plants down. As soon as I took that big plant out and cleaned the filters in the bottom pond real good, the fish started swimming much faster. The fish should be very active right now, they should be jumping and splashing water with their big tails. Not swiming slowly or moving sluggish, things to watch for ....

This time of the year, the water is very warm, the oxgen levels can drop off, and it is worse just before dawn, that is why people find the fish dead in the early morning, and usually the bigger fish that use more oxygen seem to die first.

 

[CountryEscape]

While in my ponds yesterday trimming off dead and dying lily pads, I noticed some gunk on the bottom of the koi pond that I had not noticed before. That pond is not nearly as clear as the goldfish pond. So, got my net and a bucket while I was in the pond and netted out the stuff I could feel with my toes. This morning, much clearer. It was an area between water lines and pumps and fountain that I had not cleaned out as well as other areas in the spring. Will be more careful next spring. Goldfish pond had clean bottom, and that is the pond that I have been having fish die, but no dead fish for I think 5 days again. Hoping the water changes I did is helping clear up the issue.

 

[mtpond]

I was sitting on the couch watching tv about an hour and a half ago thinking I should be heading to bed when my front yard light comes on. That light doesn't usually come on when I'm up, I'm thinking it is probably a deer and then I hear this clang so I get up to see if I can see what set the light off. When I opened the door there stood a moose about twenty five feet from me. Yikes! It looked at me and went up on the bank where the top of the waterfall is and turned and looked at me for at least 30 seconds and then ran up the hill. I went out and looked around the pond and the clang was a solar light that it had knocked over and on the low side of the pond is where it had gotten its drink, water was all over the rocks and the grass. I'm thinking I'd like to set up a camera to see what comes and visits my pond during the night.

 

[sissy]

You might be best in doing what I started after deer were sucking down 6 to 7 inches of water a night from my pond and knocking over plants and in general making a mess ,plus deer poop all around the pond area .It can't get washed into my pond but not pleasant either ,I can just imagine moose poop YIKES .I gave them there own water trough .I freshen it often and keep it filled and add solar salt to it since they love there salt blocks and it keeps algae from growing .

 

[callingcolleen1]

Good idea Sissy! You always have a solution to problems!

 

[mtpond]

We have four other water sources and they are all in about a two acre area. Our well when we aren't using any water runs out of the top of the well casing ( that's about a hundred feet from the pond). Then we have a spring that is about a hundred feet down the hill from the well. We have two more springs one down in the horse pasture and then one down the hill and across the road. When we had horses (we still have an old pony) we never had to water them we just made sure to keep the spring open in the winter. As far as I know our property is the only place up in this area that has water available for animals all year. I'm sure if we didn't have the springs we'd be having a bigger issue with animals drinking out of my pond.

 

[sissy]

I guess maybe the like the taste of fish scented water .Maybe you need to put some fishy tasting water in the other sources of water .Sure they are not after your plants in the pond and figure if they drink all the water they can get to the plants :cheerful: :cheerful:

 

[callingcolleen1]

What about a big spot light that would come on when there is movement at night around the pond, that might help.