The oaks are still dormant. I do have 40 pounds of charcoal in my waterfall box to pull out tannins, I assume that would also pull out the pollen. I have pp, but I think it would take an incredible amount in this size pond, and probably repeat applications.
Every single fish is dead and I am in shock
Too bad it's too late now to scope out your fish. Did you look at their gills, etc? Any chance they died long ago, and you just now noticed them as the thaw came?
Without any body wounds, I'm assuming you can rule out basic bacterial things like aeromona and pseudomonas....and with the size of your pond, I'm also assuming you can rule out toxic ammonia or nitrate overload.
Possibly, which will be too late to find the answer to now, but gill flukes may have taken over? Plenty enough oxygen in the water, but it doesn't get processed through the gills. (Just a thought, you now have me thinking....)
I know PP will be harder on a pond your size, but it also seems worth it, to kill anything weird and undetected that's in the water, prior to adding more fish.
Some of the viral diseases don't rear their ugly heads until the spring thaw, when temperatures in the water go up and down, but the fish and their metabolisms have not yet warmed up into full gear to balance it all. It's the key time things like that attack, a fish has low immunity at that point.
You also didn't start to feed them yet, if the water was still cold did you? They can't digest food while the water is still chilly, and it sets up an internal toxic situation.
It wouldn't take that much PP if you are using the full strength stuff. I use it, carefully, with koi in the pond. The first link gives equivalent weights by common measurements such as grams to tsp.'s etc and how to achieve a 2ppm dosage treatment level which is modest and used for ponds with fish. The second link is a source ( one of many) for the full strength stuff.
http://aquanic.org/publicat/usda_rac/efs/srac/410fs.pdf
http://www.aquaticeco.com/subcategories/2064/Potassium-Permanganate/potassium/0
Did you ever figure out what happened? I get upset when I lose one fish. I cant imagine losing the whole crew.
One fish survived - a small gold fish koi hybrid. Since she would have gone first if the water was contaminated, we are assuming that the fish somehow lacked oxygen. I still don't know how that could happen. We are going to put an aerator in the bottom of the pond this winter. I put 80 pounds of charcoal in the waterfall box, so that removed all the tannins from the oak leaves. I just have to rent a trash pump and go for a dive to clean out the bottom.
It is odd seeing just Goldie swimming alone in the pond, and she is the one fish that wouldn't come when called. I have to save up quite a bit before we can restock. I hear that Sugarloaf Koi is very nice, and his 6" are affordable - but I'd like at least 10, so affordable is still very expensive.
This morning I had another shocking scare. The pond seemed empty. The water was not running and I then saw the fish in a very shallow part where one of my waterfalls normally comes into the pond. As I walked over there it seemed that they were all gasping and dying. I quickly went to check the pumps and found a breaker hade tripped sometime in the last 18 hours or so. I had that breaker replace some time ago because I this had happened before and I thought it was faulty. It's 20 amps and should be enough for my two pumps but in retrospect I better get one breaker for each pump so that one may be still on should the other trip.
As soon as the water started running some of the fish, especially the smaller ones, started swimming around again but all my big ones seemed to be dead or dying. One twitched his tail a bit again and again and started to move from what looked like a grave. I had just purchased an pump with four airstones as I wanted to supply more oxygen to the pond. I hadn't opened the box yet. I quickly went to get the box and put the airstones in the pond at full blast. Miraculously most of the seemingly dead fish woke up again. My biggest, the Big Mamma aka the Red Bandit, is not moving though and seems to be dead. He was probably about 2 feet long and may have been getting old. I don't know yet if any others are beyong hope but it seems that these guys are tough and as soon as you give them oxygen they revive. I've not gone into the pond yet to see what I may find as I don't want to panic anyone in their weakened state. About half the fish are still hiding under the plants either too weak or dead while the other ones are merrily swimming around.
I am really surprised though as to how quickly a pond can become deadly without running water and a fresh supply of oxygen. I can't imagine how fish stay alive under ice when no air comes into the pond. I just had a generator installed as I remember being out of power for a week when Wilma went through here but I didn't know that less then a day can be so deadly.
Here a picture of Big Mamma lying on her side dead as a doornail.
Fred
Here's a shot of
How sad. I hope most of them make it. I've just started ponding and every morning have to mentally prepare myself just in case I find ONE dead. I can't imagine having to remove a 2 foot one:( I need to go an air stone before it starts getting really hot here just in case.
Cold water has more oxygen I think that's why they are okay in winter.
Oh Fred, what a crushing blow! Most of us have had something like that happen from time to time, and you're right, although we can certainly sympathize, we also scratch our heads at how deadly something can become basically over night. I have 3 smaller ponds built between our decks, and something similar happened last weekend while I was out of town. My daughter fed everyone the night before, went out the next morning, and everyone in pond 2 was floating. The hose came off the filter line, so although there was plenty of oxygen pumping into the pond from the pump, the water wasn't going through the filter, so the best guess I can come up with is that there must have been an ammonia overload. She was devesated, being the fish-sitter for only 3 days.
Your big red fish looked gorgeous, so sad to hear that one that size is now gone. I'm very attached to the very large ones that I've had for some time, a couple are larger than my pug dog!
Your big fish
Just came back from our burial. I think old age and the heart must have given up from the stress of lack of oxygen. I know koi can become very old but only under ideal conditions their entire life. With my messing around I've not exactly provided such an ideal koi lifestyle. :-(
The good news is that I found no other dead fish. They all came back to life and even ate although not as aggressively as normal. I'm glad I went over to the pond this morning rather then go somewhere else and find everyone dead tonight. Tomorrow I will call an electrician to give me two lines for my two pumps. Can't take this chance again.
I actually went over to the pond to reinstall my koi cafe which had falled into the water some time ago and needed to be fixed. Yesterday I got the controller/clock back. I now drilled through the post and put big washers on so that nothing will tear that feeder into the pond again. We live and learn every day.
Fred
PS I measured Big Mama. She was only 20 inches long but very fat and heavy.
DB...As with all the earlier responses...my heart goes out to you on the loss of your fish. I used to keep Koi, though in a much smaller pond, but found that the very harsh winters in the late 90's were a significant problem for the Koi. I live in South Jersey.
I agree with "Backspace" from Illinois that aeration (or lack of) is the most likely culprit in your unfortunate situation. I regularly lost a Koi from time to time, even while maintaining an opening in the ice to allowed gasses to dissipate. The hardy goldfish weren't affected; probably due to their much smaller size, and their descendants are still here to this day. I still feel the loss when I recall "Bonesapart," a very dark Koi with a skeletal pattern on his back, and "Midas," a brilliant gold, as his name suggests. There was "Blue" and "Big Boy" and many others lacking proper names; but still cherished all the same. They'd eat out of my hand and some gave me kisses, but they're all gone now.
It started out with me wanting a simple goldfish pond, but you know how that goes, don't you? I started with the goldfish, but once I got a look at the "big guys" in the large display ponds, I was hooked on Koi. Trouble was, I didn't have the funds required to provide them with a large enough pond, and they kept getting bigger every year! I didn't know any better at the time; that was their downfall, and my loss. It was a hard lesson to learn....if you want to keep Koi healthy and happy...give them lots of room and keep the aeration going all year long. I didn't try the year 'round aeration until long after my Koi were gone, but, in retrospect, it makes perfect sense. The larger body mass of the Koi requires a much higher percentage of oxygen, than goldfish. I was losing Koi all the while I ran a de-icer, as that kept a hole open, but didn't get additional oxygen into the water. I should have realized when I'd see the Koi come up to the opening in the ice...but I thought they were looking for warmer water, when what they needed was oxygen! I can't believe it never occured to me or my husband to provide them with more air in the water.
I'm retired now and have been busy putting in new perennial beds on my property. Reading these posts has me thinking once again about installing a proper sized Koi pond and having another go at it.
You have a magnificent pond system. I'm sure, in due time, you'll once again enjoy the delights that Koi will bring to your garden setting. I wish you all the best, as you begin again.
Rose
I lost all my fish this winter.I had a pond heater as usual; but my fish had grown larger...just a good meal for the neighborhood raccoon They weren't Koi just goldfish but I loved them, Eaiting for the water to warm up before I but new babies.JOY
Oh Fred. That's awful. I dread a power failure of any kind for any length of time. It could just as well have been a storm.
Keeping koi in zone 5 with frozen water can be challenging but it is doable. I havn't yet experienced a winter loss. I am paranoid about proper gas exchange. I keep two working deicers in the pond at all times and one in the shed ready to drop in as a backup. I have employed the backup about every other year, as they do fail without warning. I don't know why I have been so lucky thus far. Except maybe that I keep 70% of the surface open with 1500 watt deicers that add considerabley to the electric bill. It costs me more to keep koi in the winter that it does in the summer.
As for racoons, well, they have made a buffet out of my small gold fish pond, but havn't managed to get to the koi.
My racoons don't seem to bother the fish or even try to check them out. They are far to busy eating the various fruit that's in season. Right now they are munching mangoes.
They do go to get a drink or even to play in the bog part of the water run but the deep water doesn't seem to be of interest.
Couldn't get to my electrician yet but I definately recommend an extra breaker for two pumps. I've had the pumps off before but the fish were smaller and friskier then. The big ones were in much more stress and gasping then the little ones. It's obviously a matter of mass.
Here's my security system just in case we actually lose power for any length of time. It kicks in in 45 seconds after a power loss and operates everything I have except the spa. The lid in front is the access point to a 1000 gal LPG tank. If you worry about filling a car's gas tank, try a thousand gal of liquid propane sometime. Yikes! I still have to pay the bill.
Fred
Holy crap, Fred, as we have a 42' motorhome with a pretty big LP tank... we can imagine (and calculate) the cost of filling that big of a tank. Wow! I hope your fish know how much you love them!
Brenda
Those are sooommmeee expensive fish!
Whoa! My backup plan is to pray that it doesn't happen in the middle of the night so I can run to Rent.A.Center and rent a generator.
Hey guys and gals,
the generator is not just for the fish. There are two humans here too.
We experienced a power loss which ruined an entire freezer full of food and the worst of it is that we had no water as the well pump needs power. That sort of prohibits you even from going to the toilet. :-) It lasted a whole week after Wilma. Luckily we were up north and our neighbors cleaned up the smelly food but we have experienced shorter loss of power and it puts the world into a whole new perspective.
We don't know what other people do under those conditions but a fix was required here for us in hurricane land. We still have to do a new roof and windows to protect ourselves. All that costs money too. It's the price one pays for living in paradise.
When I put in the pond I didn't even think about a power loss out there. I just figured the fish wouldn't mind not having the waterfall running for a while. I even had timers put on the pumps as I wanted to run those only a few hours a day. Little did I know ...
Fred
I actually have been giving that a lot of thought this year too! When the hurricanes went through, we were out of power a week and a half. Of course you lose all food, extra freezers of meat, etc....and no trash trucks can get through to pick it up. So, if we have anything like that again...what do I do? I have very small solar pumps, but that will certainly not take care of ammonia loads, or feed a filter by any means....Not sure yet what to do if things go down...
Hello All
My brother lives in Ft. Lauderdale and he decided after the last hurricane hit south Fla. that he would get a generator. Unfortunately, not only did he have to wait forever to get it installed...it seemed that the price for the generator and the installation was almost triple what it cost us in NC. So perhaps if you are considering this major purchase you ought to arrange for it before the first hurricane when there might be a shortage and a lot of gouging. We aren't as hurricane prone here --but we do have ice storms. Several years ago were without heat/electric (no toilet either Fred) for a long period. The darkness and lack of services etc., was tolerable, but it sure was cold in the house. I went out to the deck...chopped up the ice that slid off the roof .... boiled it in a pot and then flushed with it! Since we have had the generator --- not a single missed second of electricity service. The only time I have heard it run is on Saturdays when it goes through a self-test.
MissingRosie,
tell me about waiting but at least we made it before hurricane season started. We ordered ours along with the tank and a 400 amp service change 3 months ago and just got the final county inspection approval a week ago. Supposedly we have one of the newest generators on the market. It is a water cooled V8 engine and runs very quietly. I goes on Friday afternoon for it's self test and I didn't even hear it. My neighbor across the street has better hearing and came over to tell me my generator was on. Only then did I hear it. It's got thick insulation and a quiet engine. It doesn't matter to me as it is some 75 feet from the house but most installations are right next to people's houses and quiet is important. And yes, the cost was a bit crazy but they also spent quite a bit of time here getting all this wiring sized properly. I now have an extra 45,000 kwh to play with. :-)
Fred
For the first time, I went to a fish hatchery today in Richmond IL called Keystone http://keystonehatcheries.com/ and looked at their fish. Firstly, they sell direct and had a lot of fish at great prices. I recommend their premium small koi or their very largest. They mid levels were really picked out. They had premium Butterfly at $10.00 each that were stunning but I had nearly every type he had already and didn't want a duplicate. He also had a bunch in quaranteen that he pulled out of his ponds that will be available to sell shortly. He let me look at them and there were quite a few beauties in there (all sizes and not picked apart). I happen to be in the market for a Ki Bekko and am very stubborn and want that fish type above all else right now. They didn't have any at this time. This place was very clean, very, very good prices (those $10.00 butterflies would have cost $35-60 easily at my regular store). This might be a great way to restock with some bright beautiful fish at a great price. Nice people own the place as well. They sell 100-200 koi each Saturday May-September and don't hold fish for customers.
That sounds like an awesome gennie, Fred! That will definitely add to your peace of mind.
Brenda
Sorry Fred-some of the $ I posted about those fish at Keystone were off a little. I looked at a catalog I picked up from them and the prices were a little higher (unless there is a difference in-store buying versus ordering on the phone or online???). Anyway-nice fish at good prices still. Sorry about all your troubles!
Linda
Linda,
you may be thinking I'm the original poster of this thread. I'm not. I have plenty of fish and lost only one due to lack of oxygen when my breaker for the pumps tripped for some reason.
Fred
Linda, I looked at the website for keystone hatcheries and the prices look reasonable for Koi. Time for a road trip, I need some tropicals for my pond.