Hi,

I am forever asking questions here so I figured it was time to give something back . So here are some pics of the pond and the fish

I originally started with three fry last summer. We then got 6 more fish from an LFS (2 shubunkin, 2 red comets, 2 yellow comets). One of the (yellow?) comets died so we got another one a while back. One of the fry turned orange last year but then almost reverted to black again before the winter. It is now orange and I can't distinguish him from the shop fish anymore

Here is a selection of the fish all hanging around together. The brown fish is one of the fry that survived last summer and started my pond hobby off (see my profile for more info on that story!). The white one was a yellow comet, so much for the yellow!



Here is another snap of some of the fish. I had three fry last year, two of which still haven't changed colour. You can see both of them here, but it does show just how hard it is to see these fish on a normal day.


This is an end on shot of half of the pond. It looks tiny like this! You can see the two lilies, and an Arum lily. You can also see the return from the filter into the pond. The return is split into two with a Y-piece, some water pouring into the pond to help aerate it, the rest just gushes into the pond below the surface.


And last but not least, the first lily flower this year...


Thanks to everyone for their help, the pond would definitely not look so nice and the fish so healthy without your help!

Nice pictures. But what are the "stripes" on the pond floor?

The pond is right next to a wooden panel fence, and the stripes you mention are I think the reflection of the fence in the water.

I always find it hard to take photos without the reflections spoiling the shot, the water is very clear and you can easily see the bottom of the opposite end of the pond (almost 3 meters away), but that never comes out in photos.




That is a full length shot of the pond. It has the latest addition of a very focused fountain that sprays water halfway over the pond to help aeration during the hot weather.

And for the complete picture, here is the pond when I first got it at the end of last summer.



It is a raised pond that I originally put a wall around but then had to move the pond because of other building work. The pond is now back to its original position but I will build a wooden wall around it instead of brick this time.

I am already thinking of adding a second higher pond that will cascade down into this one, where will this all stop!

I did wonder.

To stop the reflections you need a polarising filter such as THIS ONE
Other suppliers of polarising filters are available.

If you can build a brick wall, I think that would be better than timber.

It's certainly looking a lot more mature now, the lilies are lovely The fish look great, I love it when they look nice and chubby.

Hi,

Your pond looks lovely and so clear. How long ago did you put the gravel in the bottom and can you still see it or is it covered in algae now? We toyed with the idea of putting gravel in the bottom of our new pond but were told not to bother because of the algae but I must admit it does look very nice and really shows the fish and plants up.

It doesn't stop, it just gets worse, you always want to go bigger!

You mentioned you built a brick wall around it before, have you ever thought of building a raised brick built pond, would make it easy to make different sections which could cascade into each other.

Also, in response to kazs_angel. Putting gravel in the pond is not a good idea in my opinion. It's another object for the fish to catch themselves on (don't know how much your fish add up too but when your putting hundreds/thousand of pounds worth of koi in the pond it's the last thing you want). Also, silt will settle in the gravel and the gravel will make it awkward to clean. You want as little obstruction in the pond as possible for muck to settle.

My 2p worth regarding gravel in a pond.

For
It looks nice
Hides cables or pipes

Against
Gets covered in algae
Not easy to clean
Not liked by koi keepers
Can be expensive (You will need a fair bit for a pond)


Yes it does / can look nice by giving contrast to the pool and the fish, yes its also great for hiding your pond pump cable, but some will say it will damage the fish, but wait a minute, what’s that at the bottom of most fish tanks? oh its gravel.

There is also available an "under gravel pond filter" which as the name suggests involves filling a pond with gravel and a filter.
However the real downside is that although gravel starts out looking nice, it really does collect algae and all the other debris,(including bacteria) and there for must be cleaned on a regular basis How would you like to clean say a tonne of gravel every month or so, and in doing so you kill any good bacteria if you have a gravel filter.(Most don't)

Its your choice, to have or not to have, but it can not be denied, like it or loathe it, it does need cleaning.

Thanks everyone for the kind words.

As for gravel, the gravel that you see was put in last August/September. The pond is almost 2m long, and I can easily see the gravel on the floor at the far end.

Just after setting up the pond and after I realized just how good the filter was at keeping the water clear, I decided I would try and treat the pond as an outdoor fish tank, i.e. nice and colorful and you can see the fish easily. To see the fish clearly (they were brown fry at the time, and I could never see them as they were well camouflaged with the green pond sides) I put down some white and coral colored aquarium grade gravel.

It works a treat. The pond looks interesting and the fish are easily visible. Any string algae or vegetation that starts to spread onto the gravel is easily spotted and removed. I have only had to do that twice though, and only on very small parts of the gravel.

As for harming the fish, I never really thought about that. I just figured that it was destined for a goldfish tank anyway, why not at the bottom of my pond

I also suspect that the constant and massive growth of string algae on the sides of the pond has been helping to suck out much of the nitrates and possibly stop the over-algaefication of the pond. Pretty much every month I take out buckets full of string algae.

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