Ponds and pond care

In the forum that has a thread on everything I was surprised to find no thread dedicated to ponds, their care and upkeep. This seeks to address that - but if I've missed the thread I should be in - please point it out!

We've just come to own our own place, which is very exciting. It comes complete with it's own pond, which has been somewhat neglected. I pulled a random and very broken pump / light type thing out of it, but am now left with a very green coloured pond. There is also loads of silty crap at the bottom.

I want to make it more appealing to small creatures (frogs, dragonflys, water boatmen etc). How do I do that? Drain and refill? add some water treatment? Remove sludge or leave it? What plants?

I've just been reading up on this as we are looking to put a very small shallow pond in our small garden. I can share some shots from the book I was looking at later.

The garden thread is the main one: https://www.lfgss.com/conversations/176057/?offset=13100#comment17422530

The allotment one less so: https://www.lfgss.com/conversations/168422/?offset=4850#comment17423024

Do we need a dedicated thread?

As for your actual issue;

1. You don't want too many nutrients so grab some wellies and clean out the green stuff and dig out the excess silt. Leave this next to the pond for at least 24hrs before putting it in your compost/similar to allow things to return to the water.
   
2. Get some oxygenating plants in there (pretty sure nowadays people say you don't need pumps with the right plants)
   
3. Add some sort of perch for dragon fly
   
   

There's a 'wild your garden' guy on YT who has good tips on plants etc. https://youtube.com/@wildyourgardenwithjoelashton?si=t7lM7gSQTo12xoZ3
You'll want the speed set to at least 1.25 cause he loves a tagent, but browse his video list for something that fits
https://youtu.be/jG1w7MUhhXs?si=NVLnPji4G5Wk0QG9

Edit here is the first in a series of how too:
https://youtu.be/lKrjMv6TMlU?si=-S4OQcP5iYN8qg9D

We had a pond but got rid recently
probaby now is not the time but you want a decent pump to deal with the volume - you can an all in one unit - but it requires regular cleaning of sludge.
i think nearer to winter - drain the pond, hard brush - clean the liner refill add some tablets (I never bothered).

Then decorate as you wish - once you drain you can add water plants, rocks to build a lansdscape

@hugo7 covered everything pretty well. Back at my parents house we have a big pond, that is mostly very overgrown. They have never used a pump and the water always remains clear and there is lots of wildlife. They have lots of oxygenating plants though.

If anyone is interested in a load of pond stuff (pumps, filters etc?) the previous owner of our house had a big pond that we got rid of due to having young kids.
Think the filter is pretty high end and is massive.
Free if you can collect from Beckenham - DM for details.

We kept a small pond that is completely filled with silt. Has been way clearer since we got a solar air pump and small solar fountain to circulate the water.
Still loads of silt on the bottom, been planning to filter it to get rid of as much as I can, but a bit worried it will destroy the ecosystem of the pond. Sounds like it'll be alright though.

You’re describing our situation from a few months ago! We acquired a small pond and it was pretty grim. Daughter wanted some fish, which we were supportive of as animal care seems to help her develop empathy.

A couple of weeks back I drained the pond, counted nearly 200 newts and a few frogs as we scooped all the debris out!!

We’ve since refilled the pond, put lots of oxygenating plants in there, bought a pump, some fish and the redistributed the 200 newts and the water has been pretty clear since.

We do get quite a lot of algae but I think it’s due to direct sunlight but I tend to scoop the surface level stuff off when I see it.

Couple of points:

• Get a pump for your size pond
  
• Don’t put plants / animals etc straight into tap/hose water as the chlorine can be harmful - you can get a neutralising agent or wait 24 hours
  
• check out plants for different depths as these create great safety spots for fish/frogs/newts
  
• try not to remove all the sludge, I read that it’s important to leave some (can’t remember why!)
  
• It’s actually lovely watching fish and newts dart about a pond!
  

It’s actually lovely watching fish and newts dart about a pond!

The fish will eat the young newts.

Really! They are only very small goldfish. Shit the bed.

I maybe naively thought that enough hiding places would ensure everyone lived in harmony

Yeah sorry to concur, don’t do fish in ponds if you want other natural native wildlife. You have a fish pond or a wildlife pond.

Maybe that's why they are darting...just constant terror.

@Scrabble

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Thanks all. I'll get a picture tomorrow. It is pretty small. Seen those little solar pump things. I definitely don't want anything that requires mains power ...

The problem at the moment is the water is a lurid green. Does that mean I need to change the water? I don't think I could scoop just the green out...it seems like algae or something almost dissolved in the water.

I think it was @Kat_Balou or possibly @Sparky but they recommended this place:

https://www.puddleplants.co.uk/wildlife-pond-bog-garden-collections/

Not a pond per se but jonsnaturalswimmingpool on Instagram is garden goals

My pond is well established, loads of plants, 5 fish, always have frog spawn and there are a few newts but I have no pump or filtration. I think it has just naturally stabilised and the water is always clear.

It is important to not feed your fish if you have plants, they get enough food from the plants. Feeding them makes them grow quicker but also creates more fish 'waste' which upsets the balance (according to a fish expert I spoke to ages ago)

They look pretty chill, coming up for air, loads hang around under the lily pads and in the evening they all come out from the hid-y holes. But I guess they are fully grown and its the baby newts that will suffer. Crappers. Maybe I need to invite the local heron round and go full wildlife.

Google green water. Too much nitrates/crap in the water.

Get some oxygenating plants and do a water change if you can to dilute the nitrate. The plants will use the nitrate for food/fertiliser. If you have enough oxygenating plants in there it will balance out and the water will stay clear.

Fish and water boatmen will eat other insects/tadpoles etc. best not to introduce either if you can. Or duckweed as you will never get rid of the stuff.

Right - update on this...

Got all the luminous green water out of the pond, cleaned it out and filled with hose water. Then left it a few days. Pretty quickly seemed to become a home to many mosquito larvae - but this seems an important first step as other stuff likes to eat them.

The game changer was getting some pond weed (elodea i think). I (probably illegally) scooped it from a pond in Richmond Park using our spaghetti scoop and brought it home in a dry bag. The King's pond weed is now thriving in our little garden in Ham and has kept the water crystal clear. On a sunny day you can see the streams of photosynthesis bubbles oxygenating the water. Very satisfying.

The pond is now home to all manner of creepy crawlies. Pretty sure there is a whole load of dragon fly larvae in there, plus lots of smaller crawly / swimming things. For a while we had a proper pond skater, which was lovely. The best bit though was finding a frog under one of the stones we put in. Success!

I'm over the moon with how well it's progressed through late summer and early autumn. Cant wait to see what the spring and summer bring considering the amount of creatures now bedding in for winter.

The one thing I cant identify is in the picture below. Two of these appeared looking like spidery things, under the water holding onto the weed. Since then they seem to have semi coccooned themselves / detached their legs? Whatever they are up to, it's taking days. Any ideas what on earth are they?

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Nice work! Did you use an de-chlorinating stuff after? I've weighing up getting/borrowing a pond hoover for ours to give it a really good clean as we have some fish / frogs / newts and I'm a little unsure about successfully emptying the pond of all that to clean it out without hurting something in the process.

Awesome to hear.

Could be a baby one of these?

No, didn't use anything other than tap water. It was just empty for about a week, and apparently any nasties evaporate off. Lots of rain recently mean it is crystal clear. Not sure what happens in future as it will no doubt slowly fill with organic matter, which is the general enemy of clear water I think.

What the fuck is that?

This?

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