My Azolla Have Dissapeared?

[ColinM]

Thanks for all that Colin...I do believe I'll just have another drink.

Ahhhh, the perfect solution to all gardening problems! and my pleasure Pansysue

[gypsysoul]

glass of water front on

Hi Colin!
Do you have koi or goldfish in your pond or a mix? If you have koi, they will progressively eat all green plants you plant .. with very little discrimination as to what they eat. Sorry to tell you, but that's what koi do .. one reason why koi are banned in Qld, as to the threat to native waterways & native fish environments. Goldfish are a bit the same, but not as destructive nor quite as hardy.

I sell my excess Azolla, but cannot send to WA, NT or TAS. due to quarantine, but I always suggest to buyers to keep some aside in another container, with water, to grow & add it to their ponds as it grows & fills the container. Saves buying more .. fish that have not had sufficient green feed in their environment, will readily eat the pond plants first .. it's an idea to establish a pond environment before adding fish.

As to the water from my pond .. here is a pic of the water, as taken this morning. It is 100% original pic. For other forum followers, this is a pond that is 'still' & uses only bio filters eg. plants. It is stocked with various sized goldfish (Shubunkins & other comets only) that are my breeders or the babies from the last season. The pond was established from 'scratch' only 2yrs ago & I have not had to feed them on commercial feeds on a regular basis for approx. 12mths now. I have not had any die since the pond was established, apart from 2 that one of my cats caught before the plants sufficiently covered the water surface. My ONLY 'mechanical' concession is a solar powered aerator, just to give the surface some movement .. it is also 'split' to run air to an adjoining small pond where I hatch the eggs from my inside Fantails who have now decided to breed on a regular basis. (Bunch of little breeders here!)

I'm sort of sorry I didn't keep photo record of the pond's progresss .. it's so different to the empty corner I started with 2yrs ago!
Anyway, here's the pics.. Dianne.

[gypsysoul]

ps. guess you'll have to take my word for it, but the water does not have a 'smell' .. contry to what is coming out of our taps atm! I have to run our tap water thru 2 filters before I touch a drop .. this is the first time I've actually taken water out of the pond & placed it in a glass. Compared to the 'raw' water out of our taps, I'd drink this pond water rather than unfiltered tap water.
The attached pics are some of my inside fish .. they are all about 5yrs old & just fit into the palm of a hand. That's it for now .. will try to find good pics of the outside pond during it's 'growth'.

[ColinM]

Hi Dianne!

Thanks for taking the time and trouble to post those pics and content up!

It certainly sounds like you have the pond situation well and truly sussed!

That water is certainly testiment to your pond! Not so good on the mains front ay?

I'm more and more inclined to approach the suppliers of my Koi and see if they would take them back, even if it means for free! I just need to convince my wife .

The other fish I have in the pond are fantails.

That's certainly an interesting tip on feeding the fish, makes sense of course.

BTW, how many fish around the 5-7cm mark would you recommend for a almost 2,000L garden pond Dianne?

[gypsysoul]

Hi Colin!
You'll probably get a different answer to that from every one you ask! Few things .. different varieties have different needs eg. 1.koi will grow rapidly & to quite a large size, so you'd be better off to under-stock to start with & 2.they'd eat substancially more doing so & 3.therefore produce more 'waste' & possibly need more work. 4.More 'waste' could also equate to more algae blooms in hotter weather. Here's a few more 'bits' :

The amount of fish you can stock will depend on the capacity of your pond and the adult sizes of the fish you want to introduce. Remember to reduce water quantity for the displaced amounts caused by potted plants etc in the water.

One of the easiest ways to get an idea of how many fish your pond can accommodate is by using a Rule of Thumb of 1" per gallon. Sorry, you'll have to do the math. Then you have to consider this .. fast swimming fish eg. koi, commets, etc need more water than slower swimming breeds eg. fantails, ryunkins etc. Rule 'of thumb' here is 20 gallons per adult fast swimmer & about 15 gallons per adult slower swimmers. I think this would be 1cm of fish per 1.5litre to 2 litres depending on the water surface area. The deeper the pond the less fish per litre. If you have a filtration system in place, this should be ok .. but remeber bigger fish need more space.

Larger bodied species, such as goldfish, displace more water and produce more waste than a smaller bodied species of fish.

When you perform your 'rule of thumb calculation', base it on the approx. adult size of the fish. If you intend buying mature fish, measure the fish from its head to the base of it's tail. The fish in the pond pic I posted, was only about 1.5 inches long when I bought him as a 'yearling' 5yrs ago .. they grow VERY fast in large bodies of water! One of biggest boo-boo's people make is putting too many fish in a pond too soon .. they WILL breed all by themselves from a very young age & small size .. you'll soon have more at NO cost!
Even though they will eat their own eggs during spawning, you'd be surprised on how many babies you'll find later & think 'where did THAT come from?' My previous pond had no introduced fish in it .. only plants I'd bought from a local grower .. low & behold, there were baby fish in there & I hadn't even bought any! Eggs had been attached to the plants!

To tell you the truth, I don't know EXACTLY how many I have in my bigger pond .. I catch some of the smaller younger ones for local sale & there always seems more to replace them .. the bigger ones form the 'stable' population & will for some time if they reach their expected old ages of 10-20yrs old! Geez, I'll be on an old age pension by then!

DON'T be tempted to add those little fish to your pond some people call 'guppies' with black spots on their flanks .. they are 'mosquito fish' & will pull the tails & fins apart on goldfish! Horrid little things! Good for yabby bait! Here's a few more pics .. tempted them no probs to pose for the pics! Cheers for now, Dianne.
ps. would a link to a video I did work here on a forum page & is it allowed? I have a vid of my fish swimming in the pond .. no Academy Award stuff, my first & only fish vid effort!

[ColinM]

CRIKEY Dianne! My best input for that mathematical piscatorial dialogue is 1 gallon is = to 4.54609 litres (many years at WA's Water Authority ). BUT! A VERY good point - I hadn't thought of the water displacement of both the plants and fish. I'm NOT even going near water displacement of piscatorial vectors (speed of fish) - go on, give me physics as well - from an object at rest then transition to interia, and don't forget rolling resistance and cohesive friction .

I think I'll just go and have another drink

[gypsysoul]

Hi Colin! yep, have one for me, too! Nope, I'm not going there anyway, but I thought it might help?! How about you start with a dozen of around 3-6cm fish? They'll grow so fast & you will end up with more .. maybe a few won't make it to adulthood, but by the time they breed & grow you won't notice. How many do you have in there anyway? Cheers for now, need to shut the peepers. Dianne.

[ColinM]

Hi Dianne

Lets see - we have three koi - 14cm, 10cm, 3cm (the latter came from the the first two we are guessing as it just appeared ), 3 orange fantails around 5-7cm and 2 neutral colured lil guys also around 5-7cm - I THINK they are small koi.

Do you have much problem with filamentatious (carpet/long thread) algae attaching to the sides of your pots, plants (especially the water lilly stems) and pond walls?

[gypsysoul]

Hi Colin!
A short reply to that question .. no. The fish seem to take care of that .. it's actually very good food for baby fish .. also, I expect that the taddies that survive the fish eating the frogs eggs, also take care of it. I do not have snails in my pond, I find them a pest & they produce more waste than any good they do.

In my 'baby growing pond' (where the fantail's babies go after the hatching pond) there are less fish & they are also smaller .. this pond is also above the ground & a little less accessible to frogs & other 'beasties' & has very fine 'whiskers' of what I guess is the same stuff, but it isn't bright green (this pond also is more shaded in another part of the garden). I quite often see the babies eating this from the sides, so I just leave it there as it isn't 'out of control'.

I really don't have to do much at all with my ponds .. just remove any excess Azolla to the garden as mulch (or sell it), top up the water sometimes in the hottest weather, check that the solar aerator is working & the cat hasn't sat on the panel, maybe thin out the Water Clover occassionally, sit back & watch the fish .. it virtually looks after itself now. IF only the rest of the garden & lawns could do the same!

With the fish you have, they have obviously started to increase all by themselves .. or you had free-loaders as eggs on some plants, like I did at my previous place. Irritating, as the fish turned out to be very fast, plain old brown self-coloured comets & took ages to catch them before they bred with the coloured fish & I ended up with lots more dud brown ones.
You could add a few more goldfish (another half dozen maybe?) if you wanted more 'colour' in the variety you have, but keep in mind how damn big koi get & that they eat nearly everything you will add in the way of plants .. they really are swimming intestines, no stomachs .. just goes in one end & out the other, faster than goldfish! Guess that's why they always feel hungry! Anyway, no biology lessons today, I promise!

Here's a few pics just to round things off! Cheers, Dianne.

[ColinM]

Hi Dianne!

A short reply to that question .. no. The fish seem to take care of that .. it's actually very good food for baby fish .. also, I expect that the taddies that survive the fish eating the frogs eggs, also take care of it. I do not have snails in my pond, I find them a pest & they produce more waste than any good they do.

Oh, ok on the filamentatious algae - I've now stopped food feeding the fish to encourage them to eat the fil...agae. Problem is, I've just introduced some vallis to the bottom of the pond in a cut down pot - with the vallas bedded in 'pond soil' (the small rock stuff) and often find clumps floating on the surface, I suspect the Koi are culprit. I think I'll need to grow some in the waterfall feed pond and let it get really established first. Yes, I too don't have snails.

I really don't have to do much at all with my ponds .. just remove any excess Azolla to the garden as mulch (or sell it), top up the water sometimes in the hottest weather, check that the solar aerator is working & the cat hasn't sat on the panel, maybe thin out the Water Clover occassionally, sit back & watch the fish .. it virtually looks after itself now. IF only the rest of the garden & lawns could do the same!

or you had free-loaders as eggs on some plants, like I did at my previous place

Hmmm hadn't thought of that!

Thanks again for more insight Dianne!

[Pansysue]

Love that water clover gypsysoul, maybe I should try some of that, I've just bought some more floating fern off ebay so I just put some in my wee pond and see how it goes, thanks for that good tip!

This is my little effort, it's only small and I haven't really finished yet, I need to edge the garden with bush rock but I'm not sure I've finished making gardens around it yet so want to wait till I'm all done. The way I carry on that might be never! I'm always adjusting this and that around the place, adding and subtracting...but mostly adding!

When I first started it last year.

As she blows atm. I'm trying to grow the plants down to cover the plastic pipe that forms the waterfall, I didn't want to cement it under the rocks in case I need to remove it down the track.

[Pansysue]

Yep! yep! I know she's only little, but the pond was only the focal point of what I was {hoping} to achieve. The fairies won't come till it's all finished..this I know.

Ooh! that pic went twice!

[gypsysoul]

Hello PansySue! That looks so lovely & peaceful!
It doesn't matter if the water feature is small .. the idea (I think) is to have a place to pause & wonder .. from the first pics, you can see how well the plants have 'come together' in such great balance! The fern is gorgeous! Can't grow them here with our outside Winter temps .. unless you plant Bracken Fern & I'm not going there! bad
What great use of the tub & the basin! I love that we can share our ideas on this site with all the forums .. I wonder if anyone has recycled an old 'loo? I WAS going to, but hubby 'couldn't get it' as a planter!
I'm sure the 'Faeries' will visit soon! Keep your eyes out for plants you've never planted, I'm sure they leave them in my garden! I even have friends that bring me all sorts of odds n ends to place around the pond etc .. I think it's the 'Garden Goddess' sending out 'vibes' for 'offerings'!
We could post our 'whimsy' pics on one of the other forums as well, I guess .. you should see what I'm doing with my old clothesline! Still a 'work in progress' but I'll hunt for place to post it.
Here's a pic of a weird fungi that grew in some compost after the rains, right near the pond .. it was totally gross & attracted flies -guess I don't have to tell anyone why?! Cheers all, Dianne.