Does anyone know anything about gardening?

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andyfallsoff
Is this the place for pond advice? We have a (no pump) pond which filled with rainwater over winter and now has newts + other wildlife in it. It's getting pretty low now and I'm trying to refill, but have exhausted water from our water butt - all that is left is
- the really murky water butt stuff that comes out if you tilt it - there's a fair amount of this but it smells grim. Suspect it may have the undisturbed run-off from tarred shed roof in it..
- fill it from the tap, wait 24 hrs for chlorine to dissipate (how well does this work?!) And then try to fill. Risk is that we can only do a couple of watering cans at a time, not sure if tap will change the water quality too much and will the water evaporate while standing waiting to go in?
Any thoughts what people would do...? Don't want to leave the newts homeless

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bothwell in reply to @andyfallsoff

The usual advice is to just let it dry out - if it was a feral pond, then it'd dry out during the year anyway, so it's just a normal thing that small ponds do in the wild. Mine completely dried out over the drought last summer, and I thought all the plants and all the wildlife had died, but they didn't, and everything is bouncing back nicely, and if anything it's better now because my Pennyroyal is back, and I thought that had been choked out by my brooklime. Supposedly newts actually quite enjoy ponds drying out because it reduces predation.

Definitely don't use tapwater, you'll upset the balance. I know it feels bad to leave it to dry out (I was TRAUMATISED last year watching it happen), but that's the most "natural" treatment you can give it. Have a look at page 2 of this PDF on pond maintenance from Hertfordshire council
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hugo7 in reply to @andyfallsoff

Apparently not

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