- Joined
- Jan 21, 2018
- Messages
- 38
- Reaction score
- 10
- Country
I live in Newark, DE (home of the U of DE). I loved The Country Journal magazine (now defunct, sorry to say) and learned how to dig & produce my own pond without a filter. My husband was turning 70 and we were having a party - so (in spite of a huge drought that summer) I dug an 850 gal pond. I didn't know about a lot of the pointers - but now it is 2019 and the pond is still great (and so is my hubby!) - the fish and most plants winter okay - and even tho I have had my ups and downs with it, I still love it and my fish. I haven't cleaned it out (REALLY cleaned it out) in years. But I read that you shouldn't empty all of the water - just about 1/2 at the most - as the fish and plants need those beneficial bacteria which are in it. I use a large aerator with 2 stones all the time. My biggest enemy was blue herons - which live nearby - and were eating my fish. They would sit on my neighbor's roof and gaze around at everybody's pond to see if there were any orange flashes visible. So I started netting the pond - which is a pain in the neck (and often little garter snakes try & drink from the pond and get caught in the web of the net.) This year I had a HUGE growth in my plants. I always have an iris in a pot and another ? in a pot and two little variegated ?? in a pot - which winter over. I bought a huge pot of parrot feathers - and sunk the whole pot in there (It is 1' deep and one end and 3' at the other). I bought 4 water hyacinths (which of course die in the fall) - 2 were lifted by a dishonest neighbor and I bought 4 more. I must have 30 now from divisions!!! (my one neighbor cut down a tree and I have more sunlight now). Every year I have some babies, since I have no filter and they can hide in the foliage & other places. We had another WET summer and I must have 30 new beautiful colorful goldfish babies now. I'm trying to give some away. Two years ago I had 500 bullfrog tadpoles - which were amazingly huge. I gave a ton of them away and put some in our local creek. Every year, for some reason, frogs show up - and by mid-summer they are gone. I wonder why that is? I have 5 adult fish - one very large comet. One fantail I love, but don't seem to get them to reproduce. When we have emptied our pond in the past, we put a pump in it with a screen (so as not to vacuum up teeny fish) and drain it into the veggie garden - which LOVES that fish poo. I have trouble this year with acorns falling in the pond. They float, thank goodness, so I can net them out. I got those little "muck away balls" from The Pond Guy - and also use that stinky liquid stuff that is supposed to put a lot of good bacteria in there. My pond has been pretty tea-colored this year, and I guess I am due to clean it out 50% again. My net has been off for over a month due to the over abundance of plants this summer - but I'd better get it back on. I've never had raccoon troubles, thank goodness.
