Newbie from Brampton, Ontario, Canada

[jim.e.]

Hi my name's Jimmy.

Intro:
I bought a house in June of this year and the great thing about it was it came with a 720-800gallon koi pond. The original owner had 4 large koi and about 25 babies (0.5-1" in length).

I made my first huge error 1 month after owning the house by doing a water change. Never owning fish and my own ignorrance I didn't read/realize that I should not do a 100% water change. All the babies (fry?) died as well as my 8" Showa. Wasn't really happy to this outcome, and neither were the other three fish.

Fish
After a month I decided to get 2 more and then in September I bought another 2 for a total of seven:
Orenji Ogon
Kohaku
Tancho Sanke (nicknamed "bully" - largest koi I have, 12") - 1
Hikari/Platinum Ogon (not sure which one)
Tancho
the other two I'm not sure what they are. One's all black the other is black with yellow spots.

Filter: Tetra Bp1500 bio filter
UV: Tetra 9W uv sterilizer.
Pump: unknown

Water tests show everything is good, I wasn't confident in myself so I also had the pet store test it and they confirmed everything is excellent.

I've attached some images, unfortunately I don't have any "good" pics of the fish as they are scared of everything/everyone.

After the first water change that killed all the fry and showa


During summer, taken while sitting on my deck...otherwise they run away and don't eat (I know now that that's WAY too much food)


Birds thinking its a watering hole/bird bath


All hiding near pump below waterfall

 

[HARO]

Welcome to the forums, Jimmy. Always nice to see another GTA'er.
John (Bowmanville)

 

[addy1]

Jimmy

Glad you joined. You also have joined the ranks of opps should not have done that.............

 

[jim.e.]

Jimmy

Glad you joined. You also have joined the ranks of opps should not have done that.............

Pardon the ignorrance, "joined the ranks of opps"? Not sure what that means :S

 

[sissy]

welcome and thats a lot of fish in that small a pond and you would need to keep it from freezing

 

[jim.e.]

welcome and thats a lot of fish in that small a pond and you would need to keep it from freezing

Really? well that sucks.... I thought 800 gallons would be enough for these 7. I only have one that's 12" the others are 6-7" at most. And thank you, I'm looking into a pond heater as well - this will be my first winter with them. A little nerve wrecking as to they're survival.

 

[sissy]

colleen or haro should know but my koi are over 2 ft long and are 8 years old and where tiny when I got them and they produce a lot of waste and are fussy fish . :razz:

 

[Fishylove]

Welcome Jimmy! :wave:
As sissy has said, you do have quit a few fish for your size pond tho I think you'll be ok till next year. Koi grow rather fast, so by next summer you'll be needing to find a new home for a few of them. Just as an example for my birthday June 2011, my husband bought me two koi, both were 2" long; one is a ki Matsuba butterfly, the other an Aka Matsuba Ogon, so they are right under two years old. Both are now over 12" long, with the butterfly measuring 14" long, so as you can see they grow quickly, and that was 2 months ago when they were measured. The thing with koi is, they produce alot more waste than other fish, more even than common goldfish. So koi need more "fish to water ratio" space it's ok, be patient you'll learn as you go. And stick with this forum, you'll learn LOTS of great stuff!
Oh, quick question lol, in your pictures, the pond looks like it could be filled up some more, so is the 800 gallons at the level it is now? Or can you add more?

 

[jim.e.]

Welcome Jimmy! :wave:
As sissy has said, you do have quit a few fish for your size pond tho I think you'll be ok till next year. Koi grow rather fast, so by next summer you'll be needing to find a new home for a few of them. Just as an example for my birthday June 2011, my husband bought me two koi, both were 2" long; one is a ki Matsuba butterfly, the other an Aka Matsuba Ogon, so they are right under two years old. Both are now over 12" long, with the butterfly measuring 14" long, so as you can see they grow quickly, and that was 2 months ago when they were measured. The thing with koi is, they produce alot more waste than other fish, more even than common goldfish. So koi need more "fish to water ratio" space it's ok, be patient you'll learn as you go. And stick with this forum, you'll learn LOTS of great stuff!

Thanks for the response. I honestly didn't think they grew that quick but I do know they can get to be rather large. I want to do a overhaul on it next summer and make it a lot larger. I was off with the size (went with the figures previous owner gave me)...by a lot! I went out with a measuring tape after I read Sissy's post - it's only sitting at maybe 450gallons...720 at most when full...yeah bummer.

Now I know I have to do something asap or I can expect dead fish come spring. I honestly have no clue how the previous owner managed to keep them during winter in a pond this small :S

SO I spoke to a buddy of mine who use to have fish who offered to give me his old tanks that he no longer uses. Not the largest tanks but I'm hoping it let's me keep these guys indoors until I figure out what to do outside.

The tanks are: 3'length x 1.5'width/depth x 1'height and 2'length x 1.5'width/depth x 1'height ... I think the tanks should be fine for the little guys (5-7") but the Sanke might have a hard time.

Oh, quick question lol, in your pictures, the pond looks like it could be filled up some more, so is the 800 gallons at the level it is now? Or can you add more?

I can fill it back up to 720 but yeah...I'll have to rip this thing apart come spring to add more volume

 

[sissy]

Well guessing you will be working hard next year on making your pond bigger ,but make sure you set a budget and keep in it as most will say on here you end up changing things over and over again anyway .You have to find what works for you and deeper is better and you could get pond heaters but the will increase your electric .I did not think about it until after I built my pond that it was not that far from the septic tank and it gets heat from that .I have remade my tube heater that I had for my big concrete fountain back in NJ and may use that again .It is just a board painted solid black with tubes running in circles and run pond water through it and water goes back in the pond and the board with tubing sets in the sun .

 

[Fishylove]

That's a cool idea sissy, will it raise the temp in the winter?

I agree with sissy, best thing to do is have a budget before you start. I would suggest buying as big of a liner as you can afford, Then you can start digging, this way you can go as big as you can right away. I know most of the good people on here, with a few exception , when they dug their ponds wished they had made them bigger
One thing I did, and payed about 40% of the full price, was went to a local roofing supply company. They do custom cuttings on the the 45 mil rubber role roofing ( which is the same thing that is sold as a pond liner, you just have to clean it real well because of a powder they use to keep it from sticking to itself), they always have remnants left over. So I bought two remnants and seemed them together with this rubber caulk that they use to seam on roofs ( good stuff ) Let us know when you start digging, this is a great place to get ideas on shelves and all kinds of good ideas on pond designs

 

[sissy]

yeh it raises the temp of the water and think a few others on here have used it too .I could not find what I did with it when I moved here from NJ and finally found it in the corner of the basement .Rxtra liner left on to top of mine i id not cut and just folded it under and glad I did earth under the pond settled after the water was in and liner sunk in at least another 6 inches and after noticing something was happening I marked the liner so i could see and that was a month after i put it in and not sure how much it really did drop during that month but did notice it and just thought my mind was playing tricks on me .I have since lift my pond up nother foot and made it farther out of the ground than it was .The side walk next to the pond that is pavers was putting sand in the pond after heavy rains .Rubber roofing you can get all over and has gotten cheaper and all you have to do is roll it out on the lawn and hose it down .I used a tank sprayer ,like a garden sprayer ,filled it with peroxide and water and sprayed it down and put the hose on full power after and cleaned it really good .I have a big piece of roofing in my one water fall .The sun warms it up nice and makes it softer and easier to work with

 

[j.w]

Jimmy

 

[addy1]

Pardon the ignorrance, "joined the ranks of opps"? Not sure what that means :S

lol we have all managed to do something that was not in the best interest of our fish.............the opps ranks...........

 

[j.w]

Do you mean oops as in goof ups addy?

Got this off the net:
OPPS Definition / OPPS Means

The definition of OPPS is "Misspelling of 'oops'"