Cleaning the pond

I should really write a book about our goldfish. I'll spare you the details for now, but we put them in an outdoor pond last summer. They survived the winter, thanks to Pete's "gift" of a pond de-icer, and now it's time to do the spring cleanout.

I will point out at this point that I did not ever want goldfish, but I am their primary caregiver. So cleaning out the pond appears to be another of my jobs. Job 1 is getting the pump/filter running. The job description of the "stay at home" Mom is ever changing.

Last week I removed the de-icer and plugged in the pump/filter. Lovely green water spurted out until it didn't anymore. Then I pulled the pump/filter out of the pond and cleaned it out. So we have flow now. Job 2 is to get rid of green water.

Yesterday I "bucketed" out about 20 gallons of green water and then topped off with clean water. The plan is to do this daily until I can see the fish. I suppose I could catch all the fish and empty the whole pond but I tried that yesterday and only caught two very small guys, the other 8 eluding me in the murk. The good news is that the two I caught seem to be healthy, with no sign of "ick" (fin and tail rot is the official name).

Meanwhile I've got to work on how to keep the water clean and that seems to mean installing a UV filter. SO I've got to determine my pump throughput to see if it a) is sufficient for the pond as it is and b)if I need a bigger one if I hook a UV filter into the flow... Thank goodness for the internet is all I can say. It may take me til May to sort it all out even with the internet.

The mailman stopped by to see what I was doing yesterday. He was mildly amused, watching me bucket out water and then pour it through a net to make sure I wasn't going to throw out a fish with the dirty water. And it is really nasty water, though the bushes in the yard seem to enjoy it. Talk about real fish emulsion fertilizer... Score one for fertilizing on the cheap!

Cleaning the Pond © 2009
Janice Arrowood