# Bought a house...with a Pond & Fish...any helpful advice



## scaleylover (Mar 10, 2009)

As the title says really, the house we have bought has a pond & fish 








There are 4 fish I think.
There was a large white one but prior to us moving in the pond nearly drained of most of its water as the frog thing bottom right was knocked, the owners refilled it but the biggest fish wasn't looking to clever & past away the day after we moved in (not the best omen).

We've been told to feed them once a day from beginning of April till the end of August & been left some food








From a brief look I believe they may be shubunkin

Any hints & tips on anything from;-
-what should we be feeding them?
-how often should they be fed?
-how often should we clean the filter?
& any other helpful advice is welcome 

I have no idea of the capacity of the pond


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## johne.ev (Sep 14, 2008)

Hi.
What type of filter is it? Any pics of it?
How much & how often you feed them, depends on the type & size of filter you have on the pond. The media in the filter has a good bacteria grow on it, that processes the waste. The amount of food you feed, plus the type & size of filter & the amount of fish in the pond. Dictates how often the filter should be cleaned. In the summer months I would expect to clean out a filter on at least a weekly basis, again, depending on how much & how often you feed, size/type of filter & how much media it holds.
To keep pond healthy you should really change at least 10% of the water each week too.
If your going to keep the pond running, i'd suggest doing some research. Lots to go wrong if you don't really know what's involved. But well worth the effort, can't beat a pond in the garden imo.
Good luck with it.:2thumb:


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## Fargle (Aug 8, 2013)

I agree with the above, unfortunately there's only so much that can be helped over a forum when starting from scratch.

My advice is do some research on ponds and learn the basics of them and how to run them. There's articles all over the place and practiclefishkeeping is a good place to start. You don't need to know every little thing, that will come in time. But the basics of how it was built, what the pumps/filters/uv's etc all do and a little water chemistry will go a long, long way.

You're going to need to know the make and size of your filter as well as any pumps/UV's etc attached to it. Any advice over forums or if you go into a fish shop are going to need to know this.

You're also definitely going to need to know the capacity of the pond. Not down to the exact litre, but a rough estimate from length/width/average depth (a garden cane will help you here, just put something on the end so you don't puncture the liner!) Again a must if you're asking for specific advice in the future.

As for feeding, with all fish it's better little and often. Feed a small amount twice a day, as soon as they stop thrashing about for the food it's time to stop. During the summer months their metabolism is higher due to the higher temps, once it starts to cool the feeding should go down to once a day (preferably with a low protein food like wheatgrass) and eventually down to nothing over the winter. A cheap floating thermometer will let you know whats going on in the pond.

Also.....and this is an aside and totally my opinion, but do something about the cover to the pond, it looks awful. If you have kids or stupid pets then absolutely the pond needs to be fenced off. It also needs something over it to stop herons (and depending on where you live, mink/otters) from getting in, but there's more attractive ways of doing it!


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## scaleylover (Mar 10, 2009)

Thank you , will do some reading up (its on my to do list)

The pond is approximately; 8ft long & widest point 4.5ft wide

The filter is in the top left of picture but can't see any identifying markings

(unfortunately I got interrupted in my measuring up by our gas engineer coming to service the boiler & had a busy weekend everyone seemed to have an party/event planned ... 60th, Christening, 30th/house warming, stag/hen do, barn party, we managed to make it to the the first 2)


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## chalky76 (Aug 23, 2007)

scaleylover said:


> Thank you , will do some reading up (its on my to do list)
> 
> The pond is approximately; 8ft long & widest point 4.5ft wide
> 
> ...



Do you know how deep the pond is? Are there any Koi in there or are they just normal goldfish?


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