had pond 7 or 8 years and never was concerned about this . decided to ask as we did not put leave net covering pond this fall but have been dipping leaves out with a net . is it better to : 1] get every leave out 2] leave some leaves 3] leave all of them . by the way , lost a comet last week for first time in years , other than to predators , it had about four white lumps on it other three fish seem fine . i am CONCERNED about what will happen come spring have you any thoughts on this . . thanks once again . . . peace.........ps. yes , i did a search about leaves and found zero info .
Leaves in pond over winter
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This shows a before/after doing the fall/pre-winter pond maintenance
I get as many as I can, but don't worry if there are a few left. Some blow in over winter too - can't stop them all. But every situation is different - we don't have many trees around the pond that drop leaves, so we don't even have to net it. I just scoop a few times in the fall and then again in the spring. Also much of what makes it into the pond gets skimmed out.
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A pond's water is a closed system with the only exit being a water change / water overflow. There is carbon and nitrogen in the leaves that "must" go somewhere eventually... if ammonia is a byproduct then it will harm the fish in large loads until it eventually becomes nitrates, though colder weather does make ammonia less harmful.. Removing them is a positive thing to reduce the nitrogen load in the pond. I net my pond due to predators but even if I had no predators I would net cover it in the fall due to the leaves that fall in it from my trees.
The less leaves in the pond, the better. I have a lot of trees on my property, so my choices in the fall are either a) scoop leaves out multiple times a day and clean the skimmer net multiple times a day, or b) put the pond netting on around mid-October and keep 95% of the leaves out of the pond (with less work involved). After my first autumn with a pond, I now choose B. 
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Yep I choose B
When I was cleaning around the pond yesterday I once again found oak leaves. I am telling you - neither the houses next to us or behind us or even anywhere NEAR us have oak trees... how does this happen? Is someone importing oak leaves?? haha! There must be some mighty wind that blows those things for blocks!
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Burd
I made a custom fit screen this summer, last year everything in the pond died, it was a smelly mess this spring. Never again. The screen is still on.
I have a heron net over my pond. Now that it's gotten colder, I've gotten lazy tending to the pond and some leaves have dropped to the bottom, about 3-5 feet deep. Any thoughts on how to remove without damaging the liner on the bottom? Do these hose vacs work?
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1/2 inch pvc and net to keep the leaves from my neighbors tree out of the pond. made this tall enough so I️ can get under and perform whatever maintenance is needed
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Burd
Go to the pool store and get a small skimmer.
I use a pool net for scooping leaves. I make a scooping motion near the bottom two or three times to stir things up and get the leaves to float up a bit and then scoop them out. A net shouldn’t harm your liner - EPDM is pretty tough stuff.
Yes remove as much leaves as you can in late fall. I also use a pond vac to remove sludge at pond bottom. I also recommend a pond net.