My New Pond Diary May 2011
- Thread starter Tokis-Phoenix
- Start date
SchottayB
Mr. Terrorcore!
Stunning! What a great pond. Just been flicking through, makes me wish I didn't rip out my old pond 
!
Your team did a v.good job!
!Your team did a v.good job!
Caprichoso
Fish Herder
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Love the modern look to it! Very sleek yet organic at the same time, love it I'm hoping to put in a small pond one of these years but for now my container water garden will have to do. I like your plant choices as well!
I'm hoping to put in a small pond one of these years but for now my container water garden will have to do. I like your plant choices as well!
OP
OP
Tokis-Phoenix
^_^
Cool thanks
! In the end i picked up 25 goldfish today as half of them are very small (like 2-3inches big). The problem i came across when catching the fish is that there's a lot of black ones in the pond measuring 2-6inches long as most goldfish are born black (particularly ones destined to be orange in colour) and don't develop they're true colours until they're older. But small black goldfish are difficult to spot in a deep pond with a black pond liner. However, the black ones don't recognise their much more colourful orange/white/red companions as being more visible than they are and so when they're hiding from the net they shoal with their much more colourful companions. And so i decided to leave a lot of the larger orange & white goldies so i could get more of the black ones (which will be very difficult to find when its only them left)
.I also grabbed a big bag of filter muck from the old established pond filter and have chucked it in the new pond filter to help instantly cycle it
.Stunning! What a great pond. Just been flicking through, makes me wish I didn't rip out my old pond
Your team did a v.good job!
Thankyou
! Yep they were great guys, found them on Checkatrade and would recommend them to anyone thinking about doing a pond (pm me for details if interested) .Nope the waterfall is a totally separate feature to the main filtration of the pond (waterfall runs off a separate small pump) so it can be turned off in the winter without the main filtration having to be stopped
.Love the modern look to it! Very sleek yet organic at the same time, love it
Thanks
! This is just the sort of look i'm aiming for and i will definitely add more plants in time, just gonna get these ones established first and see what works in the pond. In the future i'm also planning on doing a raised wooden sleeper flowerbed in front of some of the decking in the pond and moving the garden fence out on the left side of the pond to reclaim some of the garden .Will post some new piccies in a moment
.
OP
OP
Tokis-Phoenix
^_^
My biggest goldfish, living proof that bowls are too small for goldfish 
!
He reminds me of this Natalie Dee picture ;
Anyhoo by the time i got back home it was dark and so the goldfish have had to acclimatise in the dark - i've released them now but i'll take pictures of them swimming about tomorrow when its light .
Goldfish acclimatising;
!
He reminds me of this Natalie Dee picture
;
Anyhoo by the time i got back home it was dark and so the goldfish have had to acclimatise in the dark - i've released them now but i'll take pictures of them swimming about tomorrow when its light
.Goldfish acclimatising;
OP
OP
Tokis-Phoenix
^_^
Yeah he's massive
! Would you believe he was only 3inches long when i first got him and hes done all this growing in the last 5 years 
? He's definitely my favorite goldfish- he is literally the one which started it all . He used to have a partner (orange & white comet goldfish) but she died early this year after failing to recover from wounds after being attacked by an animal. But he was always my favorite of the 2. Anyhoo, i has pics of the goldfish now 
!Mr Fatty is in the pond
;
He's very curious about the waterfall
;
One thing about having a slate grey fiberglass pond liner is that you can see the baby black goldfish so much easier (which were practically invisible against my old ponds black rubber liner)
;
Young cream/white colour goldfish
;
I love the red patterns on the tail of this young white goldfish
;
Baby goldfish hanging out together
;
The second largest goldfish currently in the pond is a white female one with red lips and red tail patterns but she seemed too interested in the leaf litter at the bottom of the pond to come up for any food & pics (it appears she's probably eating the dozens of bugs & insects which have fallen victim to the pond) so i could only get this pic of her for now;
Hope you like the pics, its been a very long time since i took any pics of my fish lol
!SchottayB
Mr. Terrorcore!
Stunning! That goldfish is HUGE! Loving the comedy picture . Coming along nice now, very good job
. Coming along nice now, very good job 
Haveagojoe
Fish Crazy
Absolutly stunning pond,I bet now you realise it was worth all the time and effort, one thing are you going to put some sort of a cover over it (please not a net) to deter herons, something like a pergola or do herons not bother you where you are, they are a right pain in the neck where I am.
BTW you have made me turn a funny shade of green.
BTW you have made me turn a funny shade of green.
OP
OP
Tokis-Phoenix
^_^
Stunning! That goldfish is HUGE! Loving the comedy picture
Thankyou very much
! I'm going to keep an eye out for a black/dark green/grey small plastic outside table as i'd like to make a central island out of one in the pond to put more pond plants on and to give the goldfish some more extra cover . The pond is beginning to get a case of green water but i lugged my UV filter over today (came free with old pond equipment and never used it) so i will see if i can hook that up to help keep the pond clear. I would not be surprised if the pond gets blanket weed too as my old pond has lots of the stuff and is very easy to accidentally transfer, but i've heard barley straw extract is quite good at getting rid of blanket weed? Hmm.Absolutly stunning pond,I bet now you realise it was worth all the time and effort, one thing are you going to put some sort of a cover over it (please not a net) to deter herons, something like a pergola or do herons not bother you where you are, they are a right pain in the neck where I am.
BTW you have made me turn a funny shade of green.
Actually the pond is already heron proof in terms of design as herons need to wade into water to hunt as they cannot directly step into deep water- so by having steep sides and a lot of depth technically herons should not be able to hunt in it. I might get a fake heron as a precaution though- the last one at my old pond worked great (i did see herons fly past the garden on occasion but not once did any of them land or go anywhere near the pond). I might get something like a pergola in the future though just to give it some shade (the whole garden is very sunny so algae could be a problem) and tree leaf protection etc, but its a real pain where i live as any form of structure needs planning permission (the pond needed planning permission, the decking needed planning permission- even when i move my fence in my own garden later this year i'm gonna need to apply for planning permission. They're very strict in this area
!).Definitely worth all the effort though
! I was getting really concerned about the time it was going to take to complete when the fiberglass on the bottom all had to be stripped down & re-done to fix a leak, but the guys did an awesome job on it and it added only a small amount of time on top of the whole project to complete .But anyhoo.
This morning i tested the pond water, results were;
0 Ammonia
0 Nitrites
20 Nitrates
7.6 PH
So the 10+ liter bag full of my old ponds established filter muck seems to have done the job and cycled the pond more or less instantly. So today i went and caught 15 more goldfish- not as many as last time but they're a bit larger on average, bringing the ponds grand total of goldfish to 40. Again by the time i got back today it was dark so no pics for now, but i'll see if i can get some pics of the new goldfish tomorrow
.One random cool thing i saw just earlier as i was acclimatising the goldfish was the white ones jumping out of the water to catch moths & other insects in the moonlight
! Very cool, i have never seen so much of this behaviour before! I live very close to a public park, river, woodland & some farmland (all my neighbours have very flowery gardens with lots of trees too) so there is a lot of bugs in the area (especially tons of moths at night). The goldfish seem to be having a great time catching moths/bugs and are jumping every couple of minutes or so to catch them (though they're not jumping very high, sort of just half body out the water, i have to admit i'm a little worried about them accidentally jumping out of the pond but for now they seem to be concentrating on the center of the pond ).
Hunterprey
Fishaholic
Very nice pond! And all the fish look happy, great job. Hope to see more pics
just read the whole thread...absolutely brilliant! well done!
OP
OP
Tokis-Phoenix
^_^
10/08/11 New fish pics
One of the new arrivals to the pond, a pearl white female Comet goldfish (she also has one orange streak on one fin and 2 tiny orange scales on one of her sides and navy blue eyes) ;
Her white scales really do shine like a pearl;
Other goldfish (including the new arrivals );
I wonder if this is one of Mr Fatty's offspring?
Hope you like the pics .
There's a lot of fish still yet to be added to the pond, so expect to see plenty of more new faces in the coming weeks .
!
.
!
One of the new arrivals to the pond, a pearl white female Comet goldfish (she also has one orange streak on one fin and 2 tiny orange scales on one of her sides and navy blue eyes)
;
Her white scales really do shine like a pearl;
Other goldfish (including the new arrivals
);
I wonder if this is one of Mr Fatty's offspring?
Hope you like the pics
.There's a lot of fish still yet to be added to the pond, so expect to see plenty of more new faces in the coming weeks
.Thankyou very muchVery nice pond! And all the fish look happy, great job. Hope to see more pics
!I will see if i can sort something out though i'm not that keen on netting
.Thankyou very much, so glad you all like it
!Similar threads
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