Oxygenator plants in winter

[sissy]

but adavisus would the shorter days do the same thing .I know my houseplants suffer in the winter from less light and then you add in all the cloudy days wouldn't that make it worse .I know plants give off oxygen during the day and then use it up at night ,so wouldn't that cause a problem with the plants and the fish ,they are all fighting for the same thing oxygen .Not sure this is right just wondering

 

[adavisus]

Submerged aquatic plants through Winter are observed to have died, the water black with pollution after ponds have been frozen over and snow blotted out the light, compared to ponds where folk have gone to the effort of clearing snow and seen much better survival

Shorter days and lower light levels are not quite so drastic as a total black out for weeks...

Regards, andy

 

[addy1]

My lilies and parrots feather survived about 2.5 months of 8 inches of ice on the pond plus snow last winter. It was not continuous snow, but quite a bit. Maybe our snow was not deep enough to block all the light.

 

[sissy]

Thats the only thing that would worry me how would you know until you saw a floating fish and by then it would be to late and if the waters that cold and partially frozen how could you ever save the rest of the fish .Don't think I would chance it after last winter and so many states being hit with more snow than ever before .

 

[adavisus]

To improve conditions for water quality, keeping a vent going daily and sweeping snow accumulation off will make a big diff

Regards, andy

 

[Catfishnut]

ArKay,

Have you ever driven around out in the countryside where you live and observed the plants that are living in your climate naturally, in the wild?

Why not plant those specimens in your pond and then you would be assured that they would survive your winter weather.

I understand that many people like to introduce the nicest looking plants from a garden shop, but I speculate that this practice isn't always the best policy. If you went out in the wild and grabbed some volunteers and put them in your pond, they would already be used to your climate, they would be natural and come back next spring I would expect. This is what I plan to do with my system.

Sincerely, why not allow nature to work with you, plants and fish alike, so that your pond emulates nature as close as possible? I think you would have a lot less work and trouble if you let nature take control of it for you. OK, this may not work on a small scale, but has anyone tried it? I know most of you are raising Koi or other goldfish (minnows) but has anyone ever set out to make an all natual pond according to your local climate and native fishes?

I am totally serious with this idea, I have been pondering it in the back of my mind for a while.

I came up with the idea about 30 years ago. Ha Ha! No joking, though. Seriously, I was about 7-10 years old and loved my aquariums. I caught wild, native fish from the lakes and rivers here and put those fish in my aquarium. It was fascinating to watch them grow!

I am talking about catfish and even GAR! Hey, they are exotic. Well, they are prehistoric and weird anyway.

I had a baby gar that was 1.2 to 1.4 inches long when I found him in a shallow puddle in the river. I scooped him up and took him home and raised him to be 5-6 inches long. I would shoot pigeons in the wild to feed him, but the grain elevator operators started poisoning the grain to get rid of the pigeons and I fed my pet gar some of that contaminated pigeon meat. He died and I was angry.

But, it was fun to watch him grow and thrive for that long.

I would take a small piece of meat, liver or heart from the pigeon and run a needle and thread through it so that it was right at the end of the thread. Then, I would hang that in the water and let the scent of the fresh blood make its way about the tank.

The GAR would eventually catch whiff of this blood and come a lookin'. He would spot the bait hanging there and then go into "stealth mode". He would not run up and grab the meat, he would plan an attack. The gar would slowly ascend and maneuver towards the meat on the thread. Almost like a driftwood log. Using his little pectoral fins, he would gracefully propel his way through the aquarium and position his snout right along side the meat. He would rest there for a while and just eyeball it. Then, when he thought the time was right, he would twist his entire body and thrash around and grab the entire chunk of meat and snap down on it and then roll and kick like the shark in the moview JAWS! As a matter of fact, I think I named him jaws. That would be about right, 1975. I would have been 9 years old that summer.

Do any of you have that vivid of a memory from when you were 9 years old? Even 16? How about 18 or 21? Nah, me neither. This one left a lasting impression on me, the little garfish that ate from my hands. I will not forget that experience, not as long as I live. It sounds very simple, but it was God's design in action and I was watching it! Experiencing it, living it!

Of course, I have to admit that I was a great fan of Mutual of Omaha's Wild Kingdom and Jacques Cousteau and the ship Calypso.

Enjoy my freinds!

Gordy

 

[CountryEscape]

Wow, Gordy, that was a great story. I could see me doing that type of thing when I was young. I used to catch guppies (I SWEAR they looked just like guppies, not minnows) in a pond/lake where my dad went to the golf course. I put them in my aquarium and called them free guppies. They had babies just like the guppies I bought at the store. One time, a mama fish was in the breeder thing and having babies, time for lunch. So, my mom rigged up a small tank and we put her in the middle of the lunch table so everyone could watch her drop her babies. There were I think 52 that time around! Haha Of course probably none of them lived, or only a couple, but that kept the numbers down. Just like my pond now, only have a total of 10-15 baby goldies from spawnings this year, and that's satisfactory to me.
Patti

 

[HARO]

I remember my introduction to fish-keeping as if it had been yesterday. A neighbour boy had a small aquarium in his room, and wanted to show me the baby guppies. I wound up with half a dozen in a jam jar, and proudly showed them to my mom; she made me take them back! Saddest day of my five-year life! But it kindled an interest that survives to this day, and will to the day I die. John :goldfish: :goldfish:

 

[adavisus]

The plants you find in the wild are by and large brutes, prolific seeders, spreaders, clumpers, the ones that are popular tend to be those which do have combinations of features which are well suited to ornamental ponds.

Waterlilies have been selectively hibridised for better growing habits and looks. When you compare iris, there is a huge diff between Yellow flag and say Japanese iris.

While you may find some gems in the wild, its another thing to be able to know which ones are good guys and which ones are going to be a problem.If your pond is small, its fairly easy to switch things around, if your pond is large and choked with several tons of cattail in one titanic knot, its not, lol

Regards, andy

 

[sissy]

It's like the irises I planted they have spread a lot and are blooming for some strange reason again this year.I planted about 30 plants in the spring and now the area is nothing but iris plants a heck of a lot more than the thirty I planted.So far this summer they have bloomed 3 times .

 

[CountryEscape]

Sissie, are you saying that your irises are blooming still now? Wow! Mine have not bloomed since maybe July, but it's their first year. Maybe next year they will be prettier for me. I'm thinking most of my plants took this year to get their toes settled in and next year will be the "watch out" year! At least I can hope.
This weekend I'm bringing in the other plants that do not like the 30's we are having at night, and put them in the basement with my florescent light. BTW, I've had the mini water lettuce and hyacinths in buckets in the garage for 2-3 weeks now with that light, and the hyacinths are really dark green and growing well. The water lettuce don't seem to be growing any more, but they are green and not dying, so that's a good thing. I'm going to put them all in the basement.
The Umbrella palm I took out is all falling down, compliments of my cats. Will put that one downstairs as well, as it doesn't look very nice right now. I plan to only plant a small portion of it next spring, since it was a tiny 4" pot, and now the root ball takes up a 5' gallon bucket in diameter.

 

[sissy]

yep .I have these purple ones and black blue yellow and orange and red ,but the others only have buds on them but this one is in full flower .I wanted to go out today to see if any of the others are blooming but it has been raining all day and tomorrow only getting up to 40 degrees and rain forecast with a chance of a possible snow shower.I just planted these early spring and this is the third time they have bloomed

 

[CountryEscape]

Are they in the ground or in the pond? I have purple irises that I got as a gift this past spring, and they were blooming when I got them in April, but not since. I have irises in the pond, but they had already bloomed when I got them, so no blooms on them since then either. So, sure makes me wonder what type of irises you have and if they are hardy in my Zone 5 area. I'll look for them next spring. I have day lilies that bloom all summer long but never heard of irises blooming multiple times. Maybe you just have the iris knack.

 

[JoaniePA]

My entire yard is planted with select native species which provide food for wildlife. Seriously, we decided three years ago not to have a lawn and planted beds and beds of native flowers, shrubs, grasses, trees. My pond has SOME native species like wild flag, and pickerel weed. I bought them at the pond store. I cut them way back in the fall. I sink my lilies to the deep. The remaining non-natives (other than lilies) are all in pots, so I remove the whole pot in the fall. I would not introduce the local pond and stream plants in our area into my pond, simply because unlike nature, my rubber lined, bio-filtered pond does not have the same checks and balances as a natural pond, and I'm not interested in introducing plant and fish diseases, snails, or parasites from the wild into the pond which I will then need to battle. My fish and trapdoors are not natives.. they are Japanese hybrids. The frogs and toads are natives, as are the birds, raccoon, and fox that visit every day. If I lived in the woods with a natural pond outside I would truly be in heaven and wouldn't have to have an artificial pond in my back yard, and wouldn't have to maintain it either, but alas.. I live in a suburban neighborhood with 1/2 acre of secluded land to play with. I am a strong supporter of native species, but just haven't found a way to do so in my shubunkin pond. :/

 

[addy1]

Nice joanie, I am slowly converting our acres of grass to plants. I try to plant natives, the wildflower fields are native. I do need to keep a mowing boundary between the woods and our "groomed" area otherwise the brambles, poison ivy etc start growing out and taking over. I use the mower to control them.