tetraman
Fishaholic
I was thinking about digging a mini pond to keep either goldfish or a few sunfish. What would I need to do? How hard would it be? How long would it take? How big could it be?
Small Ponds
- Thread starter tetraman
- Start date
The only thing stopping you from making it as big as you want is your budget, and how many fish you want.
You need to set out on the lawn what shape and size you want, use a hose to get the shape if its not square for a couple of days and it will leave the grass marked for you. You can make it as deep as you want but usually 3 foot is enough. Step the sides so you can put ledges in and you will need to work out how much liner you need to overlap by a fair amount so you can get stones to hold it down. A preformed pond means you dont need a liner, just dig out the shape of the pond, but i think you still need to put sand underneath it.
Next work out how many gallons it will roughly hold. Goldfish need around 50 gallons each but in a big space it can be flexible.
Next, get your pump and filter and get those in to position. You need the pump to turn over the volume of the pond once every hour. You might want to consider a waterfall of some such now as well.
Get a shovel and start digging it out and then line it with either carpet or sand and underlay. Carefully place the liner in to the centre and then use bricks to hold the edges up to stop the liner from falling in.
A hose is needed to start filling and stay in the bottom in bare feet and use your toes to press the liner into the corners. As it fills, gently let the edges go and the water will push the liner in to place. Corners are the tricky bit, you need to fold those over so you dont get big gaps. A lot of little folds are better than large folds.
Place the pump on the liner at the deepest point and get it all rigged up to the filter. If you dont want to bother with a waterfall then you can semi bury it in the soil in amongst plants and have it directing the outlet straight in to the pond.
Let it run for a couple of days then add bacteria to the filter and slowly add fish over a few weeks. Test your water after day 5 to check for ammonia and hopefully thats it. Ours took weeks to plan but only two days to dig and fill. Its around 600-800 gallons and has 6 goldies in it. It is hard work but worth it
Thats how we did our pond anyway, but im sure there are a lot of alternatives. My dad for example dug a hole, lined it and threw a couple of goldfish in.
You need to set out on the lawn what shape and size you want, use a hose to get the shape if its not square for a couple of days and it will leave the grass marked for you. You can make it as deep as you want but usually 3 foot is enough. Step the sides so you can put ledges in and you will need to work out how much liner you need to overlap by a fair amount so you can get stones to hold it down. A preformed pond means you dont need a liner, just dig out the shape of the pond, but i think you still need to put sand underneath it.
Next work out how many gallons it will roughly hold. Goldfish need around 50 gallons each but in a big space it can be flexible.
Next, get your pump and filter and get those in to position. You need the pump to turn over the volume of the pond once every hour. You might want to consider a waterfall of some such now as well.
Get a shovel and start digging it out and then line it with either carpet or sand and underlay. Carefully place the liner in to the centre and then use bricks to hold the edges up to stop the liner from falling in.
A hose is needed to start filling and stay in the bottom in bare feet and use your toes to press the liner into the corners. As it fills, gently let the edges go and the water will push the liner in to place. Corners are the tricky bit, you need to fold those over so you dont get big gaps. A lot of little folds are better than large folds.
Place the pump on the liner at the deepest point and get it all rigged up to the filter. If you dont want to bother with a waterfall then you can semi bury it in the soil in amongst plants and have it directing the outlet straight in to the pond.
Let it run for a couple of days then add bacteria to the filter and slowly add fish over a few weeks. Test your water after day 5 to check for ammonia and hopefully thats it. Ours took weeks to plan but only two days to dig and fill. Its around 600-800 gallons and has 6 goldies in it. It is hard work but worth it
Thats how we did our pond anyway, but im sure there are a lot of alternatives. My dad for example dug a hole, lined it and threw a couple of goldfish in.
Tokis-Phoenix
^_^
I would also like to add that particually if you live in colder climate, its important to have at least 3-4 ft depth to the pond to help make it easier on the fish hibernating through the winter- if you make the pond too shallow and you get a cold icey winter, you could lose all your fish.
If you want to go for koi or any fish that grow in the region of 2-3ft long, at least a 1000gallons is advised as a minimum pond size (and the pond really will need to be at least 4ft deep).
Filtration will add a much better quality of living for the fish, some people are also beginning to use heating in their ponds now days over winter (it has many bennefits from better health, more activity in fish and better growth and less health problems) but i have to warn you that heating ponds can be very expensive.
Over here in England, its really too late to move indoor fish into ponds now particually if they have been kept in temps above 17 degrees, but its still fine to add fish to your pond that have already been kept outside .
If you go for liner instead of a pre-made pond tub, its good to add both sand and underlay to help protect the liner for rocks or prying tree roots over the years, underlay will also help offer a certain degree of insulation to the pond as well over winter.
If you want to go for koi or any fish that grow in the region of 2-3ft long, at least a 1000gallons is advised as a minimum pond size (and the pond really will need to be at least 4ft deep).
Filtration will add a much better quality of living for the fish, some people are also beginning to use heating in their ponds now days over winter (it has many bennefits from better health, more activity in fish and better growth and less health problems) but i have to warn you that heating ponds can be very expensive.
Over here in England, its really too late to move indoor fish into ponds now particually if they have been kept in temps above 17 degrees, but its still fine to add fish to your pond that have already been kept outside
.If you go for liner instead of a pre-made pond tub, its good to add both sand and underlay to help protect the liner for rocks or prying tree roots over the years, underlay will also help offer a certain degree of insulation to the pond as well over winter.
My pond is 4 foot deep. Anyone want to see it? or not? 
or not? what a load of pollocks
New Member
Phunky Vicar
New Member
My pond is 4 foot deep. Anyone want to see it?
hiya Angel.long time no see.hope ur well ..
As for the pic's of ur pond,i'd love to see it.
Hi there mr vicar, nice to see you around too. Will get some pics up for you all to see
Similar threads
Most reactions
-
468 -
282 -
276 -
252 -
238 -
177 -
175 -
152 -
143 -
122 -
111 -
79 -
75 -
69 -
67