My Story: Selecting The Right Fish For A Garden Pond

I read somewhere that the proper stocking level should be no more than one inch of pond fish per every square foot of pool surface area. Wow! The pond we have is 19 foot by 15 foot. And what kind of pond fish should we have?

My neighbor stocked his small pond with Koi. Blue Heron paid a visit one morning, than another, and pretty soon 21 nice Koi were gone. That was expensive.

So, back we go to Aquatic Nurseries. Dick also has a fish farm with a wide variety of fish and he is an expert. What we had in mind was to have a pond fish that would eat mosquito larvae, weed algae and maintain the ecological balance of our pond.

Well, Koi was out of the question. We didn’t have 3 feet of depth.

Koi

Orfe is a good fish and our pond is large enough, but we use chemicals. It is a sensitive fish and should not be exposed to any chemicals.

Fantails and moors are not as hardy and easily prayed upon.

So, the best obvious choice was the goldfish!

These are the hardiest and would require very little. You probably wonder what do I mean by the statement that goldfish would need very little. Well, I don’t mean just to place fish into the pond and forget it.

We have a good filtration system – you’ll need one to keep your pond clean with a pond filter, but that alone is not enough. Periodic water changes must be done to maintain non-polluted, healthy water. We use a water vacuum to clean the bottom. I don’t understand how it works, but it does well as it adds water to the pond.

Our waterfall oxygenates the water and provides sufficient amount of dissolved oxygen. The pond is large enough for fish to be active and deep enough to survive the winter freeze, extreme heat and hunting birds.

The waterfall

Dick regularly treats his fish for parasites and bacterial diseases. Therefore we don’t need to quarantine new fish for a few weeks before adding it to the pond. Bringing home infected and sick fish would create expensive problem.

OK! Doing business with Dick makes it simple for us, but what about me you may ask?

The most important factors in having healthy fish are good water quality and parasite elimination!

When water quality is good, fish suffers less stress and better able to resist bacterial infection. Parasites weaken pond fish and serve as vectors for the onset of deadly bacterial and viral infections which are extremely difficult to cure.