Please learn from my mistake!

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screaminleeman

screaminleeman

Jack Dempsey
MFK Member
Nov 27, 2009
1,445
10
38
Westminster, MD
I am so depressed that I can't take this stuff anymore.

I got the bright idea to build a pond into my back deck by my inground pool. I used a preformed 160G pond (the kind with two depth levels) and built a wood base on top of a pallet to surround the deeper central portion of the plastic pond. I placed my old waterbed heater on top of the wood base yet below the plastic preformed pond. Additional 4x4 supports with plywood caps were used to brace/ support the overhanging sides of the pond. I then used aquarium silicone to "glue" the pond liner into the "preformed" plastic pond. Pea gravel was used as subtrate on the lower (deep) floor lever. Three sponge filters, a pond fountian and a 4" airstone were installed for filtration/ circulation. I used submersible LED light strings for the lighting and have several 300W heaters (currently unplugged) for wintering. I used a nylon fabric mesh with 1" x 1" openings to "cover" the pond.

Sound good? I ASSure you IT IS NOT! I have lost 6 gars (1 Florida, 1 Shortnose, and 4 Longnose, as well as several weather loaches) so far from "jumping?" through the mesh onto the wood deck and dieing from dryout. I feel like KING TURD of POOPVILLE. Cripes, I am worse then the ***hats duct tapeing the Gator gars mouths shut and releasing them.

I may have to risk (No worse then the current situation) putting the juvinile gars still alive into my farm pond LONG before I planned on doing it (After passing YOY)!

Don't be an idiot like myself and house gar in a raised patio/ deck pond. I am not even sure that I can use it for a Koi pond. The albino channel catfish and four bowfins would probably snack on them like they do the hundred or so feeder goldfish per week. Chalk yet another up to inexperience.

I am closing in on two years into the hobby, and I seem to be getting more inept and retarded as I go. When does something like success in fish keeping start to develop? Am I just plain not cut out for this hobby?:cry:
 
I've had fish since I was a kid.. and I can tell you.. you will always have more to learn. the trick is not letting yourself get to overconfident on what you do know. And understand that we are constantly improving our knowledge in general, both personally and as a collective hobby. Things have changed in leaps and bounds in just the past 10 yrs with how we keep our fish, and the species that are now being bred in captivity is sometimes mind-boggleing to me, and most people if they really sat down to think about it.

And unfortunately we all make some mistakes and lose our prized pets. Learning from the mistakes, as lame as it sounds is no different then many other things we learn. Fish in general aren't as forgiving a pet as most other "pets" out there. The same thing can happen w/ any pet. I have a friend who put up a new fence, I warned her the slats where to narrow and her lil' dog would get out. Unfortunately I was right, and it was hit by a car.

I feel for what happened, But learn from it. Otherwise it was a waste of life, imo.
 
don't get too hard on yourself man....keep the pond for koi (release the bowfins and channel cat) and get a decent size tank for your future gars
 
I don't think it is necessarily a problem with your fish keeping as much as a problem with your species choice. After the second gar jumped it should have been a clue that something was going on. If you're successfully keeping bowfin then you're far from a novice.

Is it a compatibility issue?
 
in the words of dory the fish from finding nemo "just keep swimming..." dude don't feel bad, maybe try some cichlids, or sunfish. i lost over 100$ in fish due to a 3$ angel fish that had some sort of parasite. you will make it through the hard times dude. hell your a monsterfish keepers, come on you can do this maybe gars aren't for you...
 
Sound like you like to take huge steps, perhaps? I mean, could you have moved one gar and waited awhile to see what happened? Could just be bad luck, but maybe you should be your own prosecuting attorney with ideas for awhile. I know I do better work when I say my ideas out loud and then shoot holes in them. But it sounds like you really planned that pond out for awhile and were on top of it. Were there any ammonia spikes after the fish were added? Many fish will leap to find better water. And don't gars jump in the wild, anyway? I mean, it's a rocket with teeth.

Hey, whatever it is, form a plan B and move ahead. There are 32,000 species of fish so don't let a few floppy gars slow you down.
 
Learn from the mistakes n improve your setup. Something like that I put cheaper or less liked fish in first n watch em closely before I'd put my favorites in.when I seen everything looks ok then I'd slowly add your good fish. N still watch them very closely. Sounds like good setup just need better top to keep your jumpers in. Losing fish always suks!I might be losing one of my breeder rbp to injuries from spawning or fighting. N lost my 5year old female oscar from my pair 2 weeks ago. Always look to see how you can improve your setup n try to keep your head up.
 
Madding;4249420; said:
I don't think it is necessarily a problem with your fish keeping as much as a problem with your species choice. After the second gar jumped it should have been a clue that something was going on. If you're successfully keeping bowfin then you're far from a novice.

Is it a compatibility issue?
Click to expand...

Most likely so. I did not put all of my chips in one basket (pond). I kept two bowfin, four 2" starlet sturgeon and eight baby LNG in a fully sealed indoor growout aquarium "just in case my deck pond idea failed". The bowfin hit the sturgeon like a striped bass hits a Norfolk Spot on the live line. Lost 3 of the 4 in just over a blink of the eye. I rehomed the last successfully.

The LNG fared far better. The bowfins waited a whole day to obliterate the two smallest. I am REALLY hurting for rehome space for them, and could find no feasible growout tank that they would not devoure the inhabitants or be devoured. I could not even place them back into the quaranteen tank due to some very rowdy jaguars still under observation. I had no choice but to place them into a 10G spare hospital tank until I can figure something else out. At around 3", they are already soo far outgrown that thimble of water I am pressed to decide which tank to clear.

I am leaning toward getting rid of my RBP's, but just don't know. Strange, that in the research that I did, most of the word was that it was difficult to get juvinile bowfin to eat. I can't seem to get mine to stop eating ANY AND EVERYTHING!:screwy:
 
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