What is your weather like ... today

[sissy]

well may get another baby chihuahua .Lady bought one for her 4 year old (how stupid can you be ) she paid 50 for it and it is an applehead like my pee wee .Hoping hubby will say yes and her mother does not want it .

 

[j.w]

Good luck sissy on getting the little one.

Low clouds hanging around today till this afternoon when the rains get us. 36F now. Looks like it must have rained last night cuz puddle everywhere.

Wonder if they would charge me for bringing Canadian snow across the border :biggrin:

 

[sissy]

60 degrees out worked on pond and patched driveway cracks and mowed up some of the leaves still sitting on the grass .Time to make dinner for hubby heating contractors are done .Blower motor replaced at 200 dollars ,I knew something was wrong because electric bill went up to 150 dollars .What next hmmm .Stock tank plants starting to grow again and I know we will get cold again .

 

[CountryEscape]

I planned to drive my car this morning, figured roads melted off enough, and if I could get up my 1 mile road, which is only plowed 1 car wide, I would be good to go. Well, that was a no-go this morning, as got about 1/2" snow during the night. So, drove truck, and sure glad I did! I know 1/2" is nothing, but my Charger and me just do not do well on the slick roads, and turns out the first 3 miles was snow covered, so I would have been a nervous wreck, and then the next 3 miles on the blacktop had snow on them. I don't think blacktop was slick, but would have been worried with my car. After 3 miles, no snow. So, was an isolated area that got it. Spit snow some this afternoon, too, but didn't amount to anything. Then the beautiful sun came out!
Colleen, per my pond issue, in the goldfish pond, everything is running as always during the summer. Skimmer feeds stream, which is running water under the ice. Bog is running, 4200 gph pump on milk crate in middle of pond feeds it, and it is flowing out the other end from the stream. Water bubbler is keeping hole open in front of skimmer. SO I have all sorts of running water in that pond. The koi pond, however, only has the air bubbler and that one is struggling to keep the 12-16" opening in that pond. Snow is covering the ice, which I think ice is about 3" thick, then 2-3" of packed snow. I can add water to either of the ponds, but not sure if that's going to change anything. Do you think the koi pond need more water circulation? I could have unhooked the waterfall and have the water line circulating the water around the bottom of the pond, but not sure that is a good thing when the fish are more or less hibernating. Going to get warm this weekend, rain, then cold again, so hoping most of the ice melts in the next few days. Thinking it will take more than 3 days of 40-60's to melt it, though.

 

[callingcolleen1]

It is still quite nice outside here today, and it is a whopping 45 Degrees right now!! Unfortunately it is supposed to get progressively colder ever day starting tomorrow! Looks like I might be going back to the "deep Freezer" for Christmas!

I got the high speed internet just hooked up, and it should be much faster than the tablet. I will test out loading some pictures and see how fast it is.... Testing One Two 3

OK, I Just loaded the pictures and I see it took much less time and I can post and view all the stuff I want for only 20 dollars per month for the next six months. After that it will cost about 50 dollars a month for all the internet I want. I have my phone connected as well and will set hubby's cell phone so it connects too, as it has this thing called "Shaw go wi fi" that allow's me access to my computer wi fi in many places around town, that will save me money on the cell phones, and when I am home I will always be connected to this high speed internet and then I can watch all the u-tube stuff I want!

 

[callingcolleen1]

CE if you hook that pump up that is circulating on the bottom, to circulate as close to the top of the water as you can, and create a flow and ripple on the top of the water, that should melt the ice faster.

 

[callingcolleen1]

The trouble with those bubblers, the opening in the pond is much smaller, and with so much more ice floating on the pond surface, sometimes gas bubbles can still get trapped right under the ice, where there is NOT a hole, and that can bring down the quality of the pond water. The trapped pockets of gas sometimes rise straight up to the surface of the pond d get stuck under the ice, they don't go sideways and look for the small open hole in the big pond. Here is an example of what I mean...

This is my glass top small fish tank, half of the surface top is covered in glass and the water goes right to the top of the glass. Pretend that the surface of the glass is the ice covering the pond. See the trapped gas bubbles on the surface of the glass? Sometimes those bubbles get bigger and bigger, that is how gas gets trapped under the ice! The bigger the fish get the more oxygen they require. If your fish are getting very big, it is good to see them and have larger holes for the koi as they need it much more than the goldfish do.

 

[CountryEscape]

Right now the pump is not circulating any water anywhere. I unplugged it because it got too cold, didn't want the waterfall running, figured that would chill the water more. So, I meant when the ice thaws off, I can disconnect the water line and leave it loose, but if I need to hold it at a certain position, that will take some extra thinking, but I'm sure I could figure it out. But, what I don't get is why doesn't the aerator bubbler melt the ice as fast as the water bubbler? Both are moving water at the surface, one is using water, the other is using air, so I get that the air bubbler is maybe colder than the water bubbler. Just doesn't make sense to this simple mind. :blueflower:
And, OMG, Colleen, go ahead and make us all start dreaming of springtime so early, since it's not even officially winter yet! Loved your beautiful photos and landscaping. Thanks for sharing!!!

 

[CountryEscape]

I guess I could hook up the heater and put it in the koi pond in the opening where the bubbler is, so it circulates the warmer water, and melts more ice. I don't like the ice, either, but when you figure the farm ponds and lakes are completely covered with ice, no openings, I figure the fish will be fine until the ice melts more. I don't have a choice, so it has to remain this way for now. It won't be for very long, never is here in IL. The weather changes often, just like many other places. :blueflower:

 

[callingcolleen1]

I should have taken pictures of my ponds, they are still running from pond to pond, and I have not used the heater for days now as 90 percent of the ice is gone..... except the darn edge of the bottom pond has a small section still iced over, where I left the dumb net and it got stuck in the thick ice!!

I am always nervous about having such thick ice on the pond cause you can not see what is happening to the fish. If you had a smaller half size winter pump that you could run from the pond ledge to the water surface, like I do, then the ice would melt very quick when warm out and give the fish a good size breathing hole. Too many people worry that their fish are freezing when that is fine for my fish for over 20 years of freezing running water, Better to have oxygen as that is actually more important than to worry over ice cold water. That is how I look at it!

Pictures from a few days ago when I still had lots of snow. You can see that all the ice from the near minus 40 degree weather was half gone, today it is almost all gone!

 

[callingcolleen1]

The lakes are much bigger and deeper too so that makes things better for the fish, plus large bodies of water take much longer to heat and cool. We did have fish die off one year around here at one of the smaller prairie lakes a few years back, I remember reading about it in the paper, so it does happen to smaller wild lakes too during a hard winter, and we even had them die off during a really hot summer too one year cause the lake was too shallow...

 

[brandonsdad02]

CE..I have both of my pumps running in my pond still. I don't have a bubbler running at all, but so far its been working great for me. I have my bog pump, 4,200 GPH and my waterfall pump which I think its a 5,200 GPH pump. I'm not 100% sure on those numbers, but they are keeping a nice open space of water. The ice is right up to the skimmer box opening, but the water is moving too fast inside for any ice to form inside of the skimmer box. When I add water, I use the hot water heater, which doesn't do much other than melting a little bit of ice in the pond. I didn't go check on the pond tonight, I got home late from work because I was at the new credit union setting up a checking acct. We will be wanting to get a loan for our house in the next few years, and I hear that credit unions are easier to get home loans from than a big name bank. Figured if I get a acct there now, they will be used to me when it comes time to sign my life away.

 

[mtpond]

Pond is completely ice free I can see my fish and all are accounted for :banana:. We have a winter storm watch for Wednesday afternoon to Thursday morning. Snow, wind, colder temps and icy roads. Currently 38F outside. Beautiful sunset last night not having a van and a dumpster in the picture would of been nice. LOL

 

[HARO]

. But, what I don't get is why doesn't the aerator bubbler melt the ice as fast as the water bubbler? Both are moving water at the surface, one is using water, the other is using air, so I get that the air bubbler is maybe colder than the water bubbler. Just doesn't make sense to this simple mind. :blueflower:

Where is your air pump located? If it's in an unheated space, it is pumping air at whatever the air temperature is, or maybe a degree more. Your water pump, on the other hand, is circulating water which is around 35F. Which, do you think, will melt ice faster?
John

 

[addy1]

I am getting ready to turn my air off for a while, we are heading to 65 on sunday.............record heat