pond help!

[timrandlerv10]

so the new house has two little ponds...we havent done anything to them, and they're still full after all this heat and wind. the problem is our yard is overrun with mosquitos...i had turned the pumps off (just because) a few months ago. we turned the pumps back on and everything seems to be fine...but i was wondering if we needed to add a goldfish to each pond to help keep eggs/larvae/bugs down? will one be ok in each pond, or do they need schools? do i have to get koi or will a normal goldfish be ok?

thanks,
tim

 

[NicoleC]

How big are the ponds?

Goldfish are social fish and won't be happy without 3 or 4 of them together. Plain old comet goldfish (aka 10 cent feeder fish) are fine but I bet someone has extras to get rid of... goldfish have a habit of reproducing. They do need some room to swim, though, because they get pretty big.

If the ponds are too small for goldfish, you can get "mosquito fish" that eat the mosquito larvae, although goldfish do a better job.

With either fish you'll have to keep the ponds from totally freezing over in the winter, but neither needs to be kept at a particular temperature. Just don't feed the fish after the water gets cold.

If you don't want to mess with fish, you can get anti-mosquito treatments from the farmer's co-op.

 

[Tomoko Schum]

Get a package of Mosquito Dunks (a donut shaped biological control media loaded with a type of Bathillus theringensis which is bacteria that affect only mosquitoes) from Lowe's or Home Depot.

You can also put some guppies or mosquitofish (Gambusia affinis) like Nicole suggested. You can keep mosquitofish in your garage in a small tank in winter. They are livebearers like guppies (look just like female guppies after all.)

Tomoko

 

[NicoleC]

I didn't know it was cold for mosquito fish here... I thought they could take pretty low temps. That does make goldfish more attractive.

 

[timrandlerv10]

what kind of turnover is required to keep the water aerated enough for goldfish? i think we're looking at around 50-80 gallons for each 'pond'.

 

[NicoleC]

Plenty big enough for about 3 or 4 goldfish. You won't need to aerate too much, just toss some plants in and a pump like a Mag 2.5 will be enough flow. A DIY pond filter is easy to make --- you just want something you can use to mechanically filter out crud.

Personally, I used to do 50% water changes on my small pond once a month. I used the old water as plant food and the plants LOVE fish poop.

 

[Tomoko Schum]

I don't think it's too cold for mosquitofish here, but a tiny pond can freeze solid when we have a bad winter. The last few winters have been relatively mild. A friend of mine froze goldfish for a short period. They seemed fine after they were defrosted

Do you really need to filter a small pond with just a few small goldfish, especially if the pond is planted with aquatic plants?

Tomoko

 

[NicoleC]

For a pond that small, I would. Mine was about 40 gallons before I expanded it, and it could get pretty nasty. Goldfish are not clean fish! The filter helped me export a lot of the slime and detritus.

When I expanded to about 100 gallons, the filter wasn't really necessary.