newbie confused about fish

I have fish and this is my first year. I have taken out the pump and the water is cold but the fish are still acting as if they are hungry. I guess I am confused on when I quit feeding them. They are still swimming on top so I have cut down on the food but I am still feeding them. I don't want to hurt them but I don't want to starve them. Will they just somday stop eating and stay at the bottom? Any help will be appreciated.

If the water temp falls to 50° or lower, stop feeding them. That is the temp that goldfish start going dormant.

Don't worry about starving them. With the cold weather most of the food you throw in will cause a lot of water quality problems. I read on another post that they cannot digest any food they eat when the water gets as cold as we have now and it will actually rot your poor fishies from the inside out. Not a pleasant thought. With my first pond I never fed them at all or gave them any special winter care and they did just fine and multiplied.

Thank you, I was jus out removing leaves and stuff and they just act like they are starving. They aren't staying down toward the bottom at all, yet and really active, but I will leave them alone.

Joyce

Joyce, I stop feeding mine the middle of Oct. to the middle of April. Gold fish always act like they are starving and that is how a lot of them are killed. Sorry to say that I learned that lesson the hard way. BEV

For my fish fam they get feed year around =]

My Koi book says to feed them veggie-based food even in the cold weather if they are coming to the top and act as though they are looking for food. I've been doing it for years and have not lost a fish yet. In fact,even in January and February they spawn,the little devils;)))

posyblossom - What is the title/author of the book?

snapple45, The book, The Complete Pond Solver by Tony Roocroft

If you want to research other information just type winter feeding koi in the search engine.

I decided to try cold weather feeding for myself and it certainly improved the quality of life for my fish. I have approx. 26 Koi and Goldfish.They are very healthy and this is the 4th year I have fed them all winter.

Roocroft certainly gives advice contrary to the conventional wisdom.

http://www.drsfostersmith.com/pic/article.cfm?aid=156

Yes, but look how much conventional wisdom has been proved wrong or if not wrong, not totally right.

My goal was not to have fish that are half starved just so the water will not degrade. I would rather work on keeping the water clean another way and have the fish happy and healthy and not hungry. I watch the body language of the fish. It tells when they are sick,when they are hungry and when they are spawning,and when their slime coat is protecting them completely. It tells me who are male and who are female.I had no idea that when the males push the females around they are not trying to mate,they are trying to get the female to release her eggs so they can fertilize them. So I learn from the fish by observation as well as what I read. I cannot just accept what any expert has found to be true without testing it against what I observe for myself. .

I"m not the only one,even on this thread,that has found out you can winter feed fish. The information is out there,it's just a matter of time before others find it and decide for themselves.

http://www.practical-water-gardens.com/

This is the link to more information about winter feeding

Interesting, but I'll stick to the advice of Dr. Herbert Axelrod, Blasiola, Barrie and others to discontinue feeding when water temps get below 50. I've never had skinny koi in the spring either. They're fed a good high carbohydrate diet through fall and are pretty plump buggers going into cold weather and coming back in the spring. Maybe mine are less stressed because I use 1500 watt deicers that don't let the water temp drop below 40, even in sub zero weather. They seem to have plenty of fat and stored energy reserves.

http://www.schwartzbooks.com/cgi-bin/category/1584537
http://www.axelfish.uoguelph.ca/

I keep coming back to this post. I have been watching it during the last several days....

I too stop feeding my fish when the temps get down to about 50 degrees. This past year, the temps in the pond did not drop off until about the end of October. I have not fed my fish in several weeks. I currently have koi, but have had goldfish in the past. Right now the fish are eating the algae on the sides of the pond. The algae is what will keep them going until the water temps are consistently over 50 degrees in the Spring.

I too use a couple of deicers in my pond. The pumps will be pulled when the water temps are consistently in the mid to upper 30's. The water temps have been huvering (sp?) at 41 degrees for the last couple of weeks.

With the water temps at 41 degrees, the metabolism of my fish is much slower now., which means it will take food much longer to digest in the fish's systems. This is why it is a problem to feed the fish now. The propensity for the food to rot in the stomachs of the fish is too great at this point for me to risk my fish. The algae in the pond is enough to sustain them during the course of the winter.

Additionally, we will be pulling the pumps from the pond soon and the deicers will go in. When this is done, layers of water occur in the pond at different temperatures. The deepest part of the pond will be at approximately 34 degrees. This is where the fish stay for most of the time. I know there are people that run pumps all winter long, but from everything that I have read, the indication is that the water will become 'superchilled' as the water passes through the air and disturbs these layers, thus bringing down the water temperature further - these temps could ultimately hurt your fish. No worry in regards to the oxygen content of the water at this point - the colder water has a much higher oxygen content in it than the warmer water.

Lucille, I think you have been very lucky with your fish. Good luck to you.

Snapple45, I too will stick with the confines of http://www.drsfostersmith.com (love that company)

Happ - I hope this helps. My zone isn't that much warmer than yours. Good luck to you too.

Carolyn

I too was concerned about superchilling of the water. I read about that over and over. So one year I tried leaving an older pump in all year long.I took the water temp. in the bottom of the pond and at other depths just to see for myself. Guess what? In my pond all throughout the winter the temp. went up some of the time,but never down. Then I tried a pump that was working at full capacity the next year and it never had any affect on the water temp at all. For the first 6 years I followed everything the experts said to do and I had some fish die in the Spring of each year.Then in the 6th yr. of Ponding I started observing things that made me start paying attention to what I saw,not what I read. I have not had any fish die in four years and have stocked the local hospital pond with over 700+ fish in these past few years. So if it's just that I have been lucky, I must really be a lucky,lucky person;)))

Thanks for the info Posy. This is the first year that I have had Koi and am very concerned about their safety this winter. I have two small ponds that "appear" to be connected by a stream. The top pond is a round stock tank that is about six feet across and about two feet deep and the bottom is a liner pond that is about two feet deep and around five feet across. The bottom just has goldfish and they have done very well with no care at all. Have removed everything from the bottom pond. The top has a few koi that are probably less than a foot long. I have put a heavy duty stock tank heater in that one and have pulled everything but one pump that is running a low volume waterfall. Do you think I should just leave this last pump in place along with the stock tank heater?

Hi tet...to me, that sounds like a good plan to try. The thing is, while you are trying it,if you are watching the fish and the water conditions, you should be able to see if it is an adequate winter environment.

The wonderful thing about fish is they will start behaving oddly if something is going wrong. I hope you can keep us posted as to how it goes through the winter and spring. What a learning experience your observations will be,plus you will gain confidence as you learn and observe from your unique setup.

I am finding this conversation very interesting. Living in Arizona, and having many wonderful and knowledgeable ponding friends here... and this is our first winter for our pond... I keep wondering about this very issue. Our fish are still very active, and "begging" for food... what are my fellow Arizonan's doing? Azreno???? Fishknees? Help!

Meet the oldest fish in my pond,"The Old Man of the Sea". I finally got his pic this morning and my hands are frozen. He is a ten year old Butterfly Shubunkin Goldfish.

Posey - he's beautiful. I have several goldies that must be at least 6 years old because that's when we put in our first pond. In all this time, I have had only one fish die (at least I only saw one "floater"), although a critter came thru one winter and seemed to have thinned out the herd a bit. I don't blame whatever it was (raccoon, probably). Times are hard for everyone.

But every year they multiply, so they must be very happy. And every year i try to figure out where/how to dispose of some of the overpopulation. Am too soft to give them away as feeders and there aren't as many backyard ponders now, because of the drought. So, between the two smallish ponds, I probably have 100 fish and I can't afford to put in yet another pond!
But I never thought of a hospital pond (or other such institution). Now that's a great idea and there is a pond at our main hospital.. also at some private schools. I'll start asking around.

As to winter feeding and begging goldfish -- I don't usually feed them November thru February. Or at least not on a regular basis as I do the rest of the year. Once in a while we get a few warm days and I'll throw them a little, but not often and not much. I think they are very hardy and adaptive and will survive most conditions. And, of course they beg! (although sometimes I think they're not really begging.. just telling me "hi, nice to see you" when I mosey down to check on them.
jo

jo, it sounds as though you are in tune with your fish and that is the ultimate path to be on.I can almost see those fish greeting you when you "mosey on down":))) I may be feeding my fish more than you during the winter, but there are many days when they are not hungry and then I don't feed them either. I only do it when they are seriously looking for sustance.

I have permission from the hospital grounds supervisor to stock their pond and he gives me plants if I want them in trade. I haven't taken too many plants yet as I am trying to figure out where to put all of them he offered. He installed a forty foot fountain in their pond not too long ago and it is beautiful. It even has lights under the water. I am so proud to have some of my wonderful fish living there.I used to go ice skating on this pond when I was young, so it holds many near and dear memories and now holds my fish offspring as well.

In the spring I will post a pic of their pond. It is beautiful,all natural, with water hibiscus and some kind of companion plant that blooms. I took some of the companion plants and they bloomed all summer in my pond.

I wish you great success with your pond and I hope you find a place for your offspring too.

Lucille

Lucille, that fish is gorgeous! Gotta love the fishies... we've been out enjoying ours this morning for quite a while, even put a fire in the fire pit to enjoy with our coffee! Happy ponding!

Brenda

Hey Brenda, thank you, and I too cranked up the Chimenea and sat with coffee in hand. It was mighty cold out there this morning even though the temp guage said 44F.Kindred spirits abound:)) I love winter picnics!!

6 years ago when we first put in our pond, we started out with goldfish in addition to koi. We liked the goldfish, but found them to be far too prolific for us. They were mating at least once a month and we were very quickly inundated in a 5000 gallon pond. So we got rid of all of our goldfish.

Last year we went with just koi and although the koi do pose a bit of a problem with the breeding, they are not quite as prolific as the goldfish. Currently we are giving the koi babies to a friend of ours that owns a nursery. Next year we should really have a better idea as to the offspring situation as there will be far more koi that will be of breeding age than there were this past year.

We have had our pond for 5 years and each winter we leave the waterfall on and put in a stock tank heater. So far every thing has been ok. We do not feed the koi when the water temp drops below 50 degrees. The fish move so slowly as the water gets colder if we tossed any food in it would only go into the skimmer. It's all about the water temp, not the month of the year.

ok, I put a heater in the pond and now the fish swim around it. I am guessing that is normal?

Joyce

Joyce where did you put your heater? My heater is at the end of the pond in shallow water right at the skimmer opening. The fish seldom would swim in that area anyway. The fish are in the middle of the pond at the deepest end. The reason I use a heater is to keep the water from freezing around the pump. It only operates when the water temp goes below 40.

They are gold fish and only one koi so I don't have an end shallow enough to keep them out.

You leave your pump running all winter? I wanted to do that but people talked me out of it. I think that would be so beautiful in the winter.

Joyce

I leave the pump in the pond all winter and this is the beauty of which you speak . I do not put a heater in the pond and when we get sub zero weather,after the pump starts freezing too much of the water from the pond, I shut it off till a thaw and warmer temps come back. I haven't lost a fish in several years using this technique. I feed them all year but only when they are searching for food and only veggies.

I'm standng right in the middle of the pond and ,boy, are my fish happy to see me. I just took this pic at 4:00PM.

OOPS! The pic is on its side.sorry, I will try again☻

I can't get the pic to rotate. Here is another. I'm still pretty new to digi photos.

Beautiful pictures and I do believe next year I will try keeping the pump running. I would think the water would be better for them. Now I am concerned that I am warming the water too much or making an electric bill that will cause me to have the big one....LOL. It has been 17 for several days with sleet and icing...got love it and more coming in on Monday.
Joyce

Posy, I wonder- are you rotating them in a program where you can save them that way? If you rotate them in a viewing program that might not work permanently. If you open them in microsoft office picture manager or the like, you would have to save it after you rotate. I might be telling you something duh you already know...just trying to help!

I love your pictures at any rate, I love the dots of colors and the icy wonderland surrounding them :) They do look happy to see you. I had a dream last night that my pond heaters were working so well that it brought all of my fish out of dormancy and I started feeding them again and they were happier than in the summer. LOL dreaming out fish!!

happgarden I keep the pump running to the water falls to circulate the warmer water. I could do the same thing running a pump and having the outlet at the surface of the pond with alot of water movement to keep an opening. But I like to see the falls in winter. BUT!!! you have to watch it carefully when the temp falls really low it could build an ice dam and the water from the pond can spill over. This I know from experience. Its no fun dragging a garden hose out your back door to try to melt the ice at the falls because its draining your pond. I have always used a stock tank heater and I would be afraid not too. So its what ever you find that works for you. Good ponding!!

I am using a stock tank heater for the first time this year. I have two fairly small ponds. The upper one has a couple of Koi in it and the lower has goldfish. The upper pond with the heater is competely ice free even with the bad ice storm we just had come through. The lower pond is already iced over. That heater sure is making a difference!

tetleytuna please make sure your heater has the wire cage around it so you don't burn a hole in you tank. But watch your waterfall because if it gets really cold it can cause an ice dam that could drain your pond. Maybe you should put the pump for the waterfall on a brick to keep it about 6 - 10 inches above the bottom.

Thanks Art! Duh! I think that is exactly what I have benn doing. I am just learning how all these photo programs work. I never know where the Camera is taking them when I load them into the computer. Thanks again! Got it☺

I just know that is an important dream you are having,wish I knew what it meant☺it has to be something good♥

♂Thanks all for the complements on the photos. I can tell real ponders are here because you all totally get those pics,even sideways☺☺

Thank you so much for thinking about me CB. :^) The pond I have the heater in is a metal stock tank and the heater is sitting in the middle of a larger rubber feed tub that has several inches of rock. I was hoping it would served as a heat sink. I do not have the waterfall on. Where the garden is situated is up a hill away from the house and I will not always be able to keep a close watch on it so felt that it was better not to have the falls on rather than have the concerns about ice buildup.

Hello everyone, sorry for so much bugging about my forum just trying to get it to work. LOL. so ya if anyone would like to star posting, go ahead. It would be awesome.!
Thanks

I am doing better over there flkoifarm. You are not bugging me at all. That is a nice site to go to. Once it catches on,it should be fun.

koikin