I have 5 or 6 koi and 8 or 10 goldfish in my 14 mo. old pond. I noticed recently that I have a dozen or so young fish, sort of brownish looking that are about 1 1/2 to 2 inches long. I wonder where they came from? Shall I keep them? Also water skippers appeared out of nowhere. No frogs yet.
A question about baby fish
not all goldfish turn gold. I have some 2 years old and big that I don't want, but don't know what to do with them.
tiG, do you have a fish store nearby? Perhaps they'd take them. I found a few babies in mine and thankfully my supplier said they'd take them. Thankfully!! Sick as it may sound I think they'll use them as feed for their pet gater and snakes. Yuck....Oh well, nature at it's best. "T"
I've got about 100 babies. Almost all of them have turned color now. All differenct colors too, they are so cute.
I have a neighbor that I'll share some with, they seem to have heron problems every year. Fortunately I never have.
The rest hopefully will be given to a pet shop. I certainly can't keep all of them, pond isn't big enough.
Jody, are your baby fish koi or goldfish? I'm just loving mine
mine are fancy goldfish babies. my koi died last year, it's a long story, LOL.
we just expanded our pond from 300gal to about 1200gal this weekend. got 2 new koi and one of them committed suicide, jumped right out of the pond :(
but...the babies and all the other fish are having a ball in their new bigger home. racing around there like crazy. i still have about 1/2 dozen or so babies that are brown but most of the other "100" have all turned color now. i love watching them.
I know that Mud Skippers have the capability to crawl out of the water & drag themselves along until they come to another body of water. That's probably where your water skippers came from. If you're talking about the fish-type that is. If it's the beetles, well, then, they just flew in. How is the drought treating everybody's pond? Mine is evaporating & we keep having to add water. First time this summer. No, there's no leak. Checked that, too.
Mine too...I'm losing 6-8 inches a week
Linden...I think you will do alright to keep them with your big pond! When we built ours my DH (I could almost kill him) dumped about a dozen minnows in ours thats been 4 yrs ago and today we have about 60-70 minnows ranging from size 5 incs and more babies! I wish there was a way to get them out besides netting all my fish and throwing the ones back in I want...some of my koi weighs 3 lbs or more and don't want to stress them by netting!
We've thought about putting in bream and crappie to eat them but wonder if they would eat all the others!
Can't catch them with a dip net cause they are too fast!
Wow! Isn't having a pond so interesting? Our hot, hot weather (up to 113 a couple of times) has had me adding water due to the evaporation. But the fish have survived. I just wish a frog or two would find the pond. Thanks all of you for the info.
I bought a crawdad trap at a sporting goods store and put some koi food into some netting and affixed the netting inside the trap. I have caught hundreds of Koi babies now with this devise. Just have to have the fish somewhat hungry. Put the trap so that its hole is near the surface of the water where the fish do their hungry swimming and voila. Works wonders with small fish. Should work with the minnows too.
Ponditis...I will look for one and hope to catch them buggers!
Linden...My grandson has about 100 tadpoles in an aqaurium...I could mail you some! LOL
Imaseedpicker, Wow, are you serious about the tadpoles? What will they grow into?
Ponditis, I'll try the crawdad trap. How smart you are!
Now that I opened my mouth, err keyboard, I sure hope that my idea works for you two too. And if you want some tadpoles, Linden, I live a lot closer and I have lots of them. Mine would be bullfrogs or toads. Lani
I would love tadpoles. Will my fish eat them? Will they stay at my pond? I bought a few tadpoles last year from a pet shop. I found one toad/frog in the skimmer early this spring, but it has disappeared. Sometimes at night I hear a weird noise that, if you use your imagination, it sounds like a very strange croak or something. Ok, how do we get them here and what do I do next? I'm excited!
When we come up to your area in the spring I can bring some to you. Or if you come down toward Boise lmk and I will meet you with some. Most of the ones I have given away have stayed in their ponds. Two of them moved over to the next door neighbors pond though. She had a nicer pond than the one I gave them to with more hiding places. LOL They were sure suprised when they found those bullfrog babies next door! At a party no less! I told them that those frogs didn't want to miss out on the cake and ice cream. Giggle.
Oh thank you so much. Maybe I have something here that you would like. I have a huge flower garden, lots of perennials, lots of water hyacinths (but I don't think they last through the winter, do they?) You are welcome to e-mail me. Wow!