I AM ABOUT TO TEAR MY POND DOWN!!!!

[Chad55]

I have had the worst luck with it latley. I am seriously thinking of tearing it down. It has only been like 3 weeks and I am already to that point. It all started on wed. when I noticed one of my koi dead. I was very sad as I really liked that koi. Friday night I come home from work and find another koi dead which was my favorite platinum koi. Sat I wake up and my mom told me I need to put water in it and I kinda blew her off cuz I knew that it didn't really need water. But I go out and my pond is drained a foot!!!! I cannot find the hole still and I woke up this morning and my butterfly koi is dead. I was considering last night emptying the pond and trying again inside but then I would have a huge hole in my yard. This sucks and but the only thing is none of my other fish have died. I have all my sunfish and goldfish. Also anybody got an easier way of finding the hole? The water hasn't drained anymore since then so it has to be around the water level now right?

Chad

 

[Chad55]

Ok I think I have the leak nailed down. The seal on my filter was broken. I am going to have to wait until tonight to go to the store though and then prolly another couple days to turn it on. Hope the fish last. Also anyone got an idea on the koi? I don't think I am going to give them another try though. I like the big native predators too much. But I wanna get this nailed down before I put anything expensive in there.

Chad

 

[water_baby83]

Wow, that's quite the blow you took there, but I was wondering - when you said "It has only been three weeks" - were you saying that you have only had it set up for three weeks or what? If so, then that will put a lot more into perspective. Also, do you have any pictures of your pond, and if you took any pictures of your koi after they died, if you could post those, I might be able to tell you more on what happened with them. Without knowing for sure, I can only go off of what you gave here, and if you really did have your pond set up for only 3 weeks - with that many fish, it's quite possible your parameters were not stable yet, and that the fish you purchased brought with them disease. I can go into this more later, but first things first - do you have another area to house the remainder of the fish in until you can get your pond back in working order? Start there. And if once your pond lost a "foot" of water, it didn't lose anymore - it's quite possible that the leak is within the walls. But that too depends on your structure - Cement, artificial basin? - What did you construct it of? I have a million questions, LOL, but I don't want to overload you so I will wait until you get the chance to answer those ok, LOL.

--Emi

 

[Dr Joe]

Ok I think I have the leak nailed down. The seal on my filter was broken. I am going to have to wait until tonight to go to the store though and then prolly another couple days to turn it on. Hope the fish last. Also anyone got an idea on the koi? I don't think I am going to give them another try though. I like the big native predators too much. But I wanna get this nailed down before I put anything expensive in there.

Chad

Sorry for your loss...bummer.

I forgot where you are located? Sorry...

Have you got any air or filtration going now?

Get a kiidie pool, take water out of the pond to fill it, run atleaast a powerhead and sponge filter (make sure the return splashes to help aerate) and do treated water changes every day till you get the pond cycled.

DON'T GIVE UP NOW !! You've done a great job so far.

 

[Chad55]

Im in Mich. I got everything fixed now except for my borken heart . Oh well I guess we live and learn. Thanks for the help guys and I will be back in the future I'm sure. I think I am going straight natives from now one though. So for me its to the creek!! (or lake or pond or river or whatever else I find convenient. Haha) I am guessing that I had an ammonia spike because now everything is back to normal and cycled. Im atleast glad it is cycled now.

Chad

 

[Dr Joe]

I take the other fish are living?

Native are a good way to go...Lots of activity...Lots of diversity...and you get to pick them yourself.

Send us pix.

 

[ewurm]

Don't give up, three weeks is way too early.

 

[Chad55]

I will get some pictures of the pond and try and catch some fish tomarrow if I remember. Yea all the other fish are doing great. My hopes are renewed!! Haha. Thank you guys for having confidence in me.

Chad

 

[nativelover]

chad your getting really bad with the updating part...lol...just send us links to ur other posts and that'l keep most of us happy.....except me..ive looked at those pix a thousand times...lol.

dont give up though. you did stock your pond too fast also, i know you neede room for your bowfin, but the bowfin (being native and very hardy) would have prolly survived the pond incident and you would have had you koi still (and three was too much for a 900 gal pond IMO.

 

[Chad55]

Yea I figured that the three koi was gunna be too much anyways when they grow. It was sad to see them die but I guess I would have had to get rid of them in the future anyways. I now have a bass in with the bowfin which will also go into the pond next year. I have some threads with pics of those fish in the photo lounge a page or two back and one of my bass in the native forum. I will get some pics tomarrow in the daylight if I remember.

Chad