Water Gardening: Still ponds and all advice/input, 0 by vcb1

vcb1 wrote:
I'm converting an old hot tub into a still pond. It's still sitting in its wooden base and I'm going to leave it there for now. I cleaned it all out when I discovered that the accumulated rain water, etc. killed a little gold fish I threw in -- poor little guy! It has now been sitting for a few days with clean water and a dwarf papyrus, a small amount of Anacharis and some jungle val both of which I got at my local aquarium store. I plan to add more plants. Oh, it also has a few tadpoles that I tossed in from a barrel that had collected rain water and apparently scads of tadpoles. teresamas (Teresa) has been very generous with some of her experience so far.

I'd love to hear anyone's experience in successfully keeping one of these ponds. Particularly about how to get the environment to be self-sustaining so as to support a few fish (not koi) and plants. Any ideas about water, planting, maintaining or anything else that I need to know would be most helpful.

I just love looking at some of some of the ponds here.... they make me drool with envy!!

-- Vicky