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| Last Sat when the weather got somewhat back to normal (air temp 50*, water temp 42*), I decided to start the pond back up since I had to shut it down a couple months ago (I usually leave it running during winter, but that was not possible thanks to that extended deep freeze that most of the U.S. experienced). So before I did that I went ahead and cleaned out the biofalls filter box so that any iffy water or gunk wouldn't get flushed back into the pond. The filter in question is fairly large sized, being 16" wide, 18" long, and probably close to 2' deep, and I've got it setup so that - from bottom to top - I've got a bag of lava rock, the 2" inlet pipe (which comes into the center of the filter into 2 branches to help add a bit of "swirl" to the water flow), a plastic support grate, 2 2" thick filter pads, and another bag of lava rock. From here, there's a 16" weir that feeds the stream back into the pond. The first thing that I am surprised to see is that there is a fair amount of water still in the filter (the check valve off of the pump only works some of the time), so I start bailing out the water and muck when . . . what the . . . looks like a dead fish underneath the grate. So I pull up the grate and find this brilliantly colored, mostly white goldfish about 3" long sortof semi-floating there. I can't tell if it's live or dead so I pick it up to check it out and . . . it moves!
Not really believing what I'm seeing, I take the fish down to the pond and lay it in the water - it takes it a minute, but then it gets its bearings and slowly swims towards the bottom. OK, fun's over! Get back to work! I get back to the filter, commence Operation Clean-Up, and . . . WTH!! . . . There's a second fish in the filter, and this one is definitely still alive! So I pick up this 2nd, brilliantly colored, mostly orange 3" goldfish and also put it into the pond, where it immediately swims towards the bottom and nestles between some rocks. Here's the amazing part - there is no way my current pump can suck up a fish that big - the cage surrounding the pump inlet won't even let a 1/4" stone through. So I'm wondering if I picked these guys up when they were just fry and they've been surviving in the bottom of the filter for the past 6 or 7 months? I'm kinda thinking so because the one fry that survived in the pond was approx. the same length when I last saw it, and I didn't recognize either of these 2 fish at all. "Life finds a way" sounds appropriate since they've been in the bottom of the filter for who-knows-how-long, surviving on whatever is available, then had the flow of fresh water shutdown and left for dead in about a foot of water during one of the longest stretches of cold weather in memory - and still survived. Maybe I oughta look in there again and make sure that there weren't any fish hiding in the plumbing that would've gotten flushed back into the filter . . . |
Follow-Up Postings:
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- Posted by frugalgardener 5MI (My Page) on Wed, Jan 27, 10 at 18:50
| I found 2 goldfish in my filter one fall when I was shutting it down. I figured they had to have come in as eggs. I always clean it out now with an eye for survivors. At least mine were near the top. Your poor fish! It's amazing they survived. Can you imagine what they thought when you took them out? (do fish think?) sam |
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| Seems the only babies that survive in my little pond are ones that get sucked up and grow in the filter. I find them in the top 50 gal pond and they somehow make it through 2 waterfalls and into the 600 gal pond by mid summer. I have netted a couple and put them in the pond but I think they got eaten. They seem to know when they are big enough to make the trip to the bigger pond. How do they know this stuff? |
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- Posted by timbersmith 6A (My Page) on Thu, Jan 28, 10 at 12:33
| I don't know what they were thinking, but I'd imagine that it was a bit stressful having their world turned inside out and seeing the sun for the first time (or at least the real world and not some dungeon in the bottom of a filter). It will be interesting to see if they survive into the spring, though. I've had 4 fry survive this year - one in the pond, one in the lotus tub (which is fed a constant supply of water via a 1/2" line in the falls - so that guy had to get sucked up by the pump, navigate through the filter, and find his way into that 1/2" line to get into the tub - he's currently inside in an aquarium), and these two in the bottom of the filter - for a total count of approx. 58 goldfish. Needless to say I'm gonna put a good amount up for adoption come springtime since it's fairly overpopulated as it is. Surprisingly I didn't have any water quality or algae problems at all last year. |
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