Fish Pond

Greetings!

So on our property we have a fish pond, and that's a project we had planned to put off until Spring. (House tour here) Well, while the guys were unloading the truck they spotted a new friend.

Here is a good picture of what the poor thing's living conditions. I keep fish as a hobby and something I have always had an interest in is outdoor ponds so I know how this thing is supposed to work. Typically there's a pump at the bottom of the pond that sends water to a filter at the top. The filter has a large pad to trap any small debris that made it through the hose. There are also small balls with cutouts (to give more surface area) where bacteria grows to detoxify fish waste. Well there was no water running, there were plants growing in it, leaf litter, paint chips, you name it. We fished him out and the internet named him Puddles (from whence he/she came).

To get him out I had to pull a bunch of stuff out of it. We were trying to catch the fish not tangle our net in weeds.

A little bit cleaned out.

Here he is! He lived in a plastic tote for a bit, and I felt bad. Jeffery's the one who managed to catch him.

Here's the beginning of trying to clean up the plants on the side of the fish pond, we're trying to figure out if there's liner somewhere. Jeffery also chopped down whatever that evergreen was.

Turns out there's actually water in all this plant life. Looks like there's a small stream through here.

The more we pulled, the more we realized this pond had been huge. Turns out they had planted 2 pots in the water and they ended up getting root bound in the pond. This chunk of roots wasn't even 1/3rd of what we pulled out of the lower portion of the pond. I stood next to it for scale.

We ended up having to move a lot of rock out to get those plants out so they all needed to be rearranged back around the pond. Jeffery and David ended up finishing that up while I was attending to the children.