To Cover or Not To Cover

[Christy]

The reason i cover my ponds is because in the winter we always have power outages for days sometimes a week if we have a ice storm, and i dont have to worry about trying to keep a hole in the ice, because it dont freeze under the plastic, the only thing you do is raise a corner of the plastic up to let the gases out.

 

[addy1]

oldmarine, I don't cover mine, but I also don't have koi. Two fish so far.......lol,...........one goldie one shubunkin, they just recently showed up, we had put 4 fish in 3 months or so ago.

This will be the first winter with a cold weather pond will see how it goes.

 

[JoaniePA]

I made a pvc pipe igloo last year for leaves. PVC pipes were about an inch in diameter with pretty thick walls. Worked great for leaves so we put it up again this year. I also tarped the igloo last year for the winter, and found myself outside in the first snow dump yanking the tarp off of the collapsed igloo. Soon as the weight was off everything popped back into shape. The netting stayed on all winter, the tarp stayed on for about one month. We had over 70 inches of snow within a couple of weeks last winter and the net collected a little snow, but we had no real problems with it once the tarp was off. We kept a de-icer on and even in the worst, coldest, heaviest storms there was a little hole in the ice. I won't cover this year. Just the netting. Your setup is really cool and if I had koi I might reconsider.. but I just have bunkins and comets.

Joanie

 

[oldmarine]

I appreciate everyones input on their reasoning for covering their ponds. All are good reasons to cover ponds. What I really like is everyone has their own creative way of building a cover. Where my pond sits next to the East side of our house, it only gets about a half days sun in the summer. In the winter, it really doesn't make much difference. I do have a heater in my pond along with thr pump and filter running all year long.

During the last two summers when the temps went up into the triple digits (F), I put up my 'EasyUp' awning over my pond to minumise the inpact from the sun. The first summer I had my pond we had temps up in the triple digits for about three days, and the sun killed my Irish Moss around the pond. The Wooley Thyme seems to be quite heat and cold resistant.

 

[addy1]

My pond is on its own, had a slight icing today in the bog. Still a few leaves to get out, but the big pond stayed pretty leaf free, luckily. The lily pond filled with leaves, next year I will net it. (surrounded by trees) or scoop faster............lol

The fish will be comets maybe some shubunkins, but it is deep enough to handle the cold we have here, and the fish will be fine.

 

[koisRus]

Finally had a calm day to install plastic, got this done about 12:00 today, this should help keep the leaves out. The second picture shows the inside air temp of the dome, outside is 40 degrees.

 

[addy1]

Finally had a calm day to install plastic, got this done about 12:00 today, this should help keep the leaves out. The second picture shows the inside air temp of the dome, outside is 40 degrees.

Nice! good job, my water temp is 41............

 

[koisRus]

Nice! good job, my water temp is 41............

Thank you Addy, at 3:00 my water temp was 46.6 degrees. Looks like I will be getting the Acu-rite wireless thermometer like you have for Christmas. The one that I have works most of the time, but it seems that windy days it does not work at all.

 

[addy1]

Thank you Addy, at 3:00 my water temp was 46.6 degrees. Looks like I will be getting the Acu-rite wireless thermometer like you have for Christmas. The one that I have works most of the time, but it seems that windy days it does not work at all.

Mine has seen horrendous rain, wind, cold, heat, fog, all except snow and it still registers. so I am very happy with it. (38 now in pond, lol, surface temp, we are down to 26 this am)

And the distance is pretty far, the receiver from the pond.

A great christmas present for you!

 

[Johnnie]

Finally had a calm day to install plastic, got this done about 12:00 today, this should help keep the leaves out. The second picture shows the inside air temp of the dome, outside is 40 degrees.

Thank you Addy, at 3:00 my water temp was 46.6 degrees. Looks like I will be getting the Acu-rite wireless thermometer like you have for Christmas. The one that I have works most of the time, but it seems that windy days it does not work at all.

Nice!

My fishies are still doing OK in my covered pond (hungry as usual). My covered-water temperature was 58 degrees, & outside: 25 degrees. My open garden pond has been frozen with ice on surface already. Brrr...it's cold...currently... in my neck of the woods.

 

[DrDave]

If your pond temps are holding above 55 degrees, you can give them snacks. But if the pond is dipping below 55 at night beware of feeding very much. Also, if you are going to feed, I would do it early in the day as the water temp is rising. The food will have an opportunity to be digested before nightfall.

My ponds are hovering around 52 to 56 degrees. I am not giving them anything.

 

[koisRus]

I must say that I am glad that I covered my pond this winter. The coldest water temp I have seen was ONE morning of 37 degrees. That was the coldest day of our winter, the high temp was in the teens with a wind chill in the single digits, however it was sunny all day and the water temp went up to 47 degrees.

We have had some snow but that was no issue, it did not even stick to the top of the cover, after it got a couple of inches on it, the snow slid right off.

This week we did have a really windy night and the cover blew half off, no big deal, just went out in the morning and pulled it back over.

 

[Christy]

KoisRus, i covered my ponds to, and my water was in the 30's and 40's under the plastic,we had alot of snow to,i think i had to sweep the snow off about 4 times other times it blew off to.

 

[koisRus]

Another good thing about covering my pond over the Winter, the plants are really starting to grow!! My Iris's are about 5" above the water surface, the tall grass ( not real sure what to call it, my neighbor gave me some roots last fall from his pond), is about 12 to 16"" above the surface, and I see a my Lilly starting to grow a pad.

I live just outside of Philly and it is still getting pretty cold at night around here.

 

[keikoasmom]

After all of this time I am still having trouble understanding why people insist that their ponds need to be covered. Granted, I have a small 365 gallon pond, and this is the third winter that I didn't cover my pond. I have only added a small heater that keeps the water temp just above freezing. My fish have never showed any signs of stress or discomfort being exposed to the sky during the winter.

GOD doesn't cover the streams, ponds, and lakes. Can someone give me a good reason why they go through all of the expense and trouble of covering their ponds each winter?

Well, I originally didn't think it was possible, but here in Colorado, where it can get to -18 and the pond can completely feeze over, I can sort of understand....
BUT I think the biggest draw is keeping leaves out.
God doesn't have to keep leaves out of his pumps and make sure that the waterways don't get clogged. We have had leaf issues and we have had 4"
thick ice met in the center and create a "bridge" that forced the water out of the waterfall and off to the side! We probably lost over 500 gallons of water before
we found it. Luckily, my son told me to watch that.
The fish need oxygen, too. God's water has a water source, fresh coming in and moving downstream, generally. If the pond is stagnant, God's fish die.
So we need a hole in the ice if the water doesn't keep moving, and we have had power outages and ice in the skimmer where the pump was useless for
a time.
So I can see how covering it could be nice, but I also think that the winds we have, plus the heavy snowfall that we have sometimes, might cause a big problem. Blow the thing over or collapse it into the water....

Our pond is about 2500 gallons, and three levels not counting the waterfall.

Not sure how big it is, acerage-wise~

The "bottom pond" is about 12' in diameter, I think the waterway where the bridge is was about 6', the middle pond (deepest) is about 8-10' long, and the "top pond", just a pool, originally planned for minnows, who all went down stream.... is about 6', but also the waterfall, about 8'? So mayhbe 42' long and hmmm, 10-15' wide.
There are curves.

Here is the winter....

See the hose? That was the year the water "jumped" over the side....
we keep a hose in the basement now, for emergencies.....
(thawed)....

I don't see how we can cover it, but it would make checking it and
keeping it trouble-free a lot easier, potentially.
IF there is access and I can easily get in.....