My Plants/Fish are Dying, help

My Stella D'oro dayllily yesterday

For pond problems, check the following possibilities:

Are grass clippings or other debris getting into the pond and decaying?

If you allow any organic material to decay in your pond, the ecosystem is thrown out of balance and fish and plants die. Remove dead or dying water lily pads and flowers. Remove any other dead or dying plants. Of course, remove dead fish immediately. Your pond could easily be crystal clear and the ecosystem could be out of balance. Be aware and check your pond at least once weekly. I also advise changing at least 10% of the water weekly.

Have you or your neighbors sprayed fertilizers, pesticides or insecticides?

With termite problem in New Orleans, most people have a pest control service to kill termites and other bug critters. Although post Katrina, the termites have evacuated, we expect them to return forthwith and spraying will begin anew.

Many folks hire horticultural companies who specialize in spraying the garden for every kind of bug, destructive or beneficial. Not only does this practice kill all the good bugs, it keeps butterflies and hummingbirds from visiting, it also can easily kill your pond.

Has the local government done any spraying nearby lately?

This is a problem here in New Orleans because we have mosquitoes and therefore we have a mosquito control program. They send trucks out to destroy mosquitoes. They swear they will not harm plants or fish, but I am suspect of any chemicals.

Is someone painting or scraping a house or car in the area?

Paint from the house, especially lead paint, can get in your pond and kill everything.

Has cleaning been done on surrounding driveways, decks or walkways and run off into the pond?

I include this only because I was at my wit's end several years ago trying to figure out why I could not keep a client's pond healthy. After months of investigation, I finally asked a housekeeper if she was cleaning the surrounding patio. She said, "Of course, I scrub it and hose it down every day." OK, there was my answer. She stopped and the pond was healthy again.

Did someone feed the fish too much or the wrong thing?

Feeding goldfish is probably the biggest problem pond people have. All of you want to feed those poor fish. Those poor fish need to eat what is good for them; submerged vegetation, algae and mosquito larvae. Please make them work for their room and board. Koi must be fed and live in a pond with filtration.

Did you use a new concrete block to prop a water plant up? Use bricks or aged concrete blocks?

Lime can leach out of the concrete and quickly throw the pH into the stratosphere.

If any of these events have occurred, change the water immediately. Don't forget the dechlor.

Keeping anacharis alive

Louisiana Iris black gamecock bud

Now on to anacharis problems:


If you have a concrete pond that has not been properly sealed or is new, lime will leach out of the concrete. Empty the pond, scrub it with vinegar or a mild solution of muriatic acid (one part acid to 4 parts water). Refill, test the pH. (It should be around 7.0). Let the water sit for a day or two and test again. If the pH remains about 7.0, you may replace your anacharis.(Don't forget the dechlor.)

Anacharis likes to be in the shade. If it is in full sun, it may turn yellow and die. Shade the pond with floating plants and emergents. Use water hyacinths if they are legal in your state. They are legal to own, but illegal to sell in Louisiana. They were imported in 1884 to help keep the bayous clean. They do that indeed, but they now completely cover the bayous and are considered a noxious weed. So if you do use them in a tropical or subtropical climate, please throw them in a compost heap when they multiply, not in any other body of water. You can also use water lilies or any other floater that can provide shade for your pond. Some people build an arbor to keep the pond in shade for part of the day.

Make sure you have one bunch of anacharis per square foot of surface area of water. If you have less, the fish may be eating it faster than it grows. This is most important. I know anacharis is expensive, but if you buy it a little at a time, it will cost much more because you will have to keep replacing it.

Anacharis acts as a filter, catching and holding suspended material in the pond. With anacharis your pond will stay balanced and crystal clear with no other filtration as long as you don't feed your fish.

I built a pond, now what?

First of all, you need to realize that a pond is a living breathing organism that needs little maintenance if it is started properly. If you obey the following 10 laws, your pond will be happy and healthy and in turn, make you the same.


1. You must have one bunch of anacharis (underwater grass) per square foot of water surface area. This serves as a natural filter and as food for the fish. It grows faster than the fish can eat it.

2. 50 - 60% of the surface of the water must be shaded with floating plants. Water lilies are great, as are water hyacinths, water lettuce or water poppies.

3. You must have fish to complete the balanced ecosystem. I recommend common goldfish. Do not put Japanese Koi in your pond. They will eat all of your plants...and they will do it quickly. If you have a koi pond, you have an outdoor aquarium and must treat it as such.

4. Do not feed your goldfish. EVER!! They will become too big for the pond and upset the ecosystem. You will have an overpopulation problem and eventually all of your fish will die. You may break this law, but if you do, you must have filtration in place.

5. Put in one linear foot of fish for each 25 square foot of pond surface area. If you have 100 square feet of pond, you may have 4 foot long fish, 8 six inch fish or 16 three inch fish and so on.

6. Do not allow turtles, crawfish, alligators, ducks, geese, dogs, raccoons or possums to swim in your pond.

7. Do not use chemicals!!! EVER! Add a dechlorinator when you first fill the pond and then when you add more than 10% water afterwards.

8. Do not worry about pH. It will take care of itself.

9. Remove any dead or decaying vegetation regularly so that ammonia does not build up and foul your pond.

10. Relax. Your pond will generally take care of itself. I recommend benevolent neglect as the best approach to pondkeeping.

Mosquito fish

Remember awhile ago we talked about mosquito fish


I got this letter from a fish farm owner who adds to my education and, I hope, yours about these critters.

On Apr 10, 2007, at 6:54 AM, Colin D Calway wrote:

Hi Jan,

I was reading your comments about mosquito fish, (Gambusia).

I raise millions of these fish for mosquito control at my fish farm in Florida. Also we raise Koi carp, tropical fish and all sorts of aquatic and bog plants.

When in ponds with other fish they present little or no problem. Like a lot of fish they are territorial, when in small areas like fish tanks they will defend their territory by ganging up on other species of fish.

Bottom line is they are a native fish which have been around for a long time. I hear comments like they eat fish eggs, frog eggs and tadpoles. This is true but tell me one fish that does not do the same and most of them have a lot larger mouths.

The biggest enemy we have at the farm are the walking catfish. These fish are decimating many of our smaller tropical fish.

I enjoyed reading your article.

Best regards,

Colin D. Calway.

Happy Trails Aquatics. A natural and biological way to control mosquitoes. Visit us on line.

Bog garden, continued

Because it rained from dawn to dark yesterday, you can see the reason I need a bog garden. Those black piles of soil are where crawfish pushed their way up so they would not drown under all the rain that fell and stayed right where it fell in my front yard. All that rain delayed progress on the garden for a full day.



All day did not go to waste. Luckily the garage is big, so the walkway sections got built and put into place. Now we can walk to the mailbox at the street without hip boots.



And here is half the bog today. You can see how fast bog or swamp plants grow in Louisiana. After you plant them, you must jump back or they will hit you in the face on their way up.
They are happy plants in all that water.


The bog progress will continue with updates as the bog continues to crowd out the crawfish chimneys.

My Bog Garden

I just planted a bog garden in my front yard. Seems strange, you say, to put bog garden in a front yard. Well, I guess it is. But you don't have my front yard.

My new front yard is so low and the water table is so high that crawfish chimneys dot the grass. Most plants cannot grow unless I put raised berms in and the plants in the berms. That means I have to water the plants daily and that certainly doesn't help the high water table situation at all.

After Katrina took our last house where the water table was much lower, we jumped on this house that did not flood. After Katrina, there was no rain in Southeast Louisiana for more than 6 months, so who knew that crawfish laid a claim on my front yard. When the rains got back to normal, my yard was a minefield. I could have caught the mud bugs and eaten them if I were not a vegan.

After trying to figure out what to do with the yard and after writing several articles about bog gardens, I decided to work with what I had rather than against it. I have no idea why there was some sort of disconnect in my brain that allowed me to write numerous bog and rain garden articles, but not consider one for my yard. I shall call it post Katrina PTSD.

So, all these months after Katrina, living in a new house where I could not walk to the mailbox without getting wet to my ankles, I decided to put in a bog garden.

It began with removing grass and moving it to where the septic tank installer had left a 10 foot wide strip of sandy clay where nothing grows in hopes of it grabbing on and maybe growing. One can hope.

That left two large areas of mud or mud holes as my mother would call them.






I had already ordered cannas, cattails, papyrus, cyperus, sedge, rushes, marsh marigolds, dozens of irises and cardinalis for my bog. I was thrilled when they arrived.

I order plants bare root from a grower, so they are tiny when they arrive. But you can see the plants in the mud if you look hard.

I decided I needed to mulch them up so we would not have our own mosquito breeding factory.
Ran out of mulch before I was done, so you are seeing bogs in progress.





I have the rest of the mulch which will be applied tomorrow. I have the wood for the walkway to install between the front porch and the mailbox, so we will not have to drive around the boggy yard just to retrieve mail.

My pond looks like pea soup

Questions for the pondlady: I followed all the rules, did everything you said to do, Jan, but my pond is completely green. I couldn't buy all the submerged vegetation at once, so am buying it a little every week. Oh, and my grandkids feed the fish, but only when they come over.

PL answers: Add more underwater vegetation. Without enough the pond will turn green. The fish love to eat it and, the fish will eat it faster than it grows if you don't have enough. Without extra filtration, you must have 1 bunch of submerged vegetation per square foot of surface. If not, the fish will eat it all and you will be buying it every week forever. And it's a very expensive fish food.

And how often do your grandchildren come over?? And are they feeding those fish Poptarts? If those grandkids must feed the fish, chop up some cooked carrots, or green beans. And then feed them less than a teaspoon. This assumes the feeders visit only once weekly, not daily.

Excess fertilizer will turn the pond green. Stagger your fertilization schedule if necessary. Change 25% of your water weekly until pond clears. (Don't forget the dechlor.) Changing the water is important for the pond. And the veggie beds love it.

Making the pond appear bigger

If for some reason you cannot make your pond as large as you would like, there are design tricks you can use to fool the eye into seeing water where there is none. Try a dry stream bed or dry lake using rocks. Occasionally I have placed round river rocks carefully in a pattern and epoxied them in. I then spray them with a clear lacquer occasionally to keep them looking wet. In the picture, the client wanted a moving water look to go with her more natural looking pond and landscape. You can use whatever you wish. Design is not some secret science that only pros use. It is what looks good to you. Have fun with it.

Let's Talk Design

Design, whether it is a garden or cathedral, a living room or your wardrobe is all the same. It is simply putting things where you think they look best. Anyone can do it. See how the rock wall in the picture forms a sort of wiggly, lazy line that ties two parts of the garden together with the pond in the middle. The rocks made the garden a whole unit rather than just a pond sticking in up in the middle of the yard.

Most everyone is afraid of the word design. They think it is some magic talent that only some people have. Nope, everyone can learn design. If you can put clothes on that look nice on you, you can design anything. Some people go to school to learn it, others, like me, just have to realize that it isn't anything special and go for it. Obviously, I love garden design. I also love interior design, not that you could really tell by the inside of the house. Garden design lets you work with incredibly beautiful materials, outside with the only challenges being size, weather, and light conditions.

I think all of design is about light and how it strikes what is in the garden. It hits broadleaf plants and creates a shadow below. It strikes strap leaf plants and creates geometric patterns with the plant itself and creates shadows that make the small color plants pop in the sun.

Countless books have been written about garden design. There are schools devoted to it. But all you really need to know is 'tall stuff in the back and green side up'.

Start a Pond Society

We pond builders love visitors to our gardens and ponds and hope that our visitors will enjoy our ponds as much as we do. We want them to question us about the plants, the fish, the waterfall. We want them to ask, "How did you DO that?" We are rightfully proud of our ponds and we want to show them off.

Have you thought about organizing a pond society in your area? You could get together and swap ideas and plants. And get to meet other great folks. Have monthly or bi-monthly meetings at each others' houses, so you can show off your garden.

When I was still in business, I sponsored a yearly pond tour. Pond owners would open their back yards to the public and hundreds of people would get to admire ponds. Admission fees went to charity and it was a great advertising tool for me.

I also sponsored, "Build a Pond Day." Once a year, my staff would build a pond at a nursing home or other care facility, a school or a public garden. Again, all admission fees went to charity and I got great publicity. Attendees would see how easily and quickly a pond could be built - we were usually done by about 1:00pm. And if the watchers wanted to help, they were encouraged to do so.

All of these activities are great ways to educate the public about ponds and pondkeeping. People love to look at other people's back yards and you want to show yours off. It's a win win situation and much fun for everyone.

Tiny pond

I call this the tiniest pond I have ever done. It is simply a casserole dish balanced ecologically so the water will not be stagnant.

Now I can hear all of you saying, "What about mosquitoes? What about West Nile Virus?"

We use mosquito fish to keep those biters gone.




The fish have a large appetite, and one female can devour several hundred mosquito larvae per day. They reproduce rapidly and are unlike other fish, they bear live young. Each female can produce three to four broods in her lifetime, and each brood can vary from 40 to 100 fry.

Birth usually occurs during the warm spring and summer months. When the young are born, they are active and immediately swim for the nearest cover. Though they are only about 3/8-inch long, they will soon feed.

Sounds wonderful, doesn't it? Well, not quite.

Mosquito fish have negative ecological impacts anywhere they are introduced. They compete with native species of minnow for available forage or harass those competitors until they die. They have been especially devastating in the American Southwest interacting with a wide range of threatened or endangered fish species.

Many states are using the fish for mosquito control. As always, I wonder if the cure will be worse than the disease.

Pond Conversation Overheard

Pre Katrina, my office overlooked our front yard where the pond was. One unusual New Orleans day when we could have our windows open, I overheard the following conversation:

Man and woman, probably husband and wife, looking at the pond and waterfall:

He: "I wonder how 'he' did that. Where is all that water coming from?"

She: "Silly, the water is coming from the garden hose. Anyone can see that. What I wonder is where is it going? I'd hate to pay their water bill."

And these people reproduce.

Wild Plants

Spring is arriving quickly in all parts of the country and we want our ponds to look great. So we are starting to replace plants that didn't make it over the winter.
Some of who live near bayous or swamps are tempted to gather some from local waters, bring them home and pot them up.
If you gather plants from the wild, you will bring in parasites and diseases. If you must harvest from the roadsides and swamps, first of all, be careful. Critter live in those plants. Sometimes those critters don't like humans invading their territory, so if you must wade in the swamps, wear sturdy boots and gloves. Many of those critters like to bite, scratch, sting or otherwise make us not want to bother them ever again.

Second, check local laws, it may be illegal to take home wild plants where you live. Or it may be illegal to own the plants altogether because of their invasiveness.

Third, put your plants in a washtub or bucket of water with a cup of so of clorox in it. Leave them there for a week to ten days. Some people say that the plants should be in quarantine for up to a year. That will kill any parasites or other bugs that may have found their way home with you.

One way to overwinter a pond

Dear Jan,

I have successfully overwintered a "temporary" pond in an 18" deep, 8 foot diameter plastic kiddy pool (plants, fish and all) in a minus 40 (oops that's celsius, not sure in farenheit?) winter. (Because we were moving and I had to dismantle my larger pool before winter). I did this by dropping a stock tank heater (with a metal guard to ensure that the plastic edges didn't melt) into the pond. It keeps the water just above freezing and keeps a hole in the ice, even in the coldest weather. I didn't keep track of what it did to my electric bill because I knew I needed it, so the pond wouldn't freeze solid. Then I built a raised pool (it was three feet deep but most of it was above ground except for the deepest parts in the centre) and I continued to use the stock tank heater with a lot of success. Everything survived through the winter. I purchased the heater at the local farm supply store.

The only problem with this idea might be the cost of running the heaters, but it certainly is something to consider for next winter.

Pond Filtration?

If you have Koi or if you feed your goldfish, you MUST have filtration of some sort. There are many filters on the market from a plain sponge type to biofilters with UV lights. I have used them all and find that the very best is a biofilter installed outside the pond with a UV light installed in conjunction with it. (A UV light is not effective with blanketweed or String Algae.) So if you are going to feed those fish or have Koi, think about using this filter. The downside of these bead filters is the cost. They can run to $4000.00 with the flick of a fish's tail. There are cheaper ones that work just as well, but it's more work to keep them clean and running properly.

If you wish to build your own filter, it is quite simple using a container of some sort and filling it with some sort of filtration medium like lava rocks, sand, gravel, etc. I use the coarser material at the top of the filter (where the water goes in) and the finer material at the bottom. Much of the time lava rock or bioballs are sufficient.

You must get the water into the top of the filter- pretty easy if the fliter is in the water and suck it out of the bottom with the pond pump. This can be accomplished with a simple tap that attaches to the intake of the pump. You can also just put the pump in the bottom of the container, and put the lava rocks or whatever filter media you use in a mesh bag and not have to worry about a tap of any kind. Your cost just went down to the cost of the media plus the cost of the mesh bag. Just be sure to protect your pump intake so lava rocks do not get into your impeller.

If you do not feed your fish, you need no filtration at all. BUT you must provide natural filtration. The best way I have found is to use anacharis as a submerged plant. The anacharis grows faster than the fish can eat it, so the pond becomes a natural ecosystem. And you must keep about 50-60% of the top of the pond covered with shade. You can do this with floating plants like hyacinths, water clover, water poppy, parrots feather or water lilies. If your pond is in the shade already, you do not need so many floating plants.

Many chemicals are sold that promise a clear pond if you add the chemicals. Some of the time they work. For the most part they do not. They kill algae. The dead algae sinks to the bottom and leave no available carbon dioxide for the other plants. They die and so do the fish because there is no oxygen for them to breathe. If you do not use chemicals, this problem can be avoided before it starts.

Fish question

I get emails with questions. I try to answer the best I can. This is an example:

Question:

My next door neighbor had a mosquito killing mister sort of system installed that sprays ULD HydroPy-300 two times in the am and two in the pm.

Within days our gold fish began dying. Our water tested great for fish conditions. I couldn't find anyone local to test the water for pesticides. There is approx. 80ft w/some trees between their system and our fish pond. I did take note that we lost more fish after a couple of particular windy days.

Do you think their system is what is killing our fish? The company that installed the system said there is no way their system had anything to do with the fish dying. However, the neighbor agreed to cut off the system for a few days and the fish stopped dying.

Answer:
I would bet the ranch that the mister killed your fish.
I don't know the pesticide they used in the mister. Do you have a local cooperative extension or local agricultural college in driving distance? Is there a private lab
in town? Anytime there is spraying done, the pond needs to be covered. This can happen when gardeners use pesticide sprays, when grass cutters are there. Even when you or a neighbor is sanding a house prepping it for a new paint job, do at least a 50% water change just for safety's sake.

The Shade Pond

Ponds in the shade are prettier than in full sun, I think. There are some aquatic plants that won't do well, of course, just like any garden. Water lilies need at least 5 hours of sun daily, so most likely they will live, but not bloom in the shade pond. Good aquatics for the shade pond are Taro, acorus, umbrella grass, egyptian papyrus and calla lilies. In fact, Callas will not grow in the sun, so the shade pond can have 'the perfect flower for every occasion.' Surrounding the pond can be broadleaf plants that will not tolerate sun, like philodrendon selloum, although I do not recommend it because of it's ability to send out a root into the water and then take off and come up through your kitchen floor.
You can have ferns and other plants that make the pond a woodland masterpiece.

Plants and Fish

IF YOU HAVE KOI, DISREGARD THIS POST! Koi eat plants, all plants, all the time. You can screen off your koi or your plants, but if you allow the koi access to the plants, you will have larger koi and fewer plants.

For a garden pond to be successful, it must contain both plants and fish. Not only is this an optimum esthetic condition; but a balanced biotope with interactions between plants and fish will ensure proper water conditions, reduce insects, especially mosquitos, since the fish consume their larva, and plants will greatly reduce the development of algae.

Plants and fish benefit each other in two ways. First, fish and plants contribute to the successful functioning of the nitrogen cycle. As the waste products excreted by fish are released into the water, they are converted to ammonia and then to nitrites and nitrates by nitrifying bacteria. Nitrates are a food or fertilizer for plants and algae. As they are absorbed, plants and algae become a valuable food resource for fish, thus completing the nitrogen cycle.

This ongoing biological cycle ensures healthy pond life. It is important to realize that if plants are not thriving, algae will take over and the water will become murky.

A second important way fish and plants complement one other is through the process of photosynthesis. Fish require oxygen for their existence and they release carbon dioxide. Plants in turn require carbon dioxide for their successful existence and emit oxygen. During sunlight, plants will consume the carbon dioxide released by fish and in turn emit oxygen required by fish.

A constantly functioning nitrogen cycle and photosynthesis are the key components to a successful and beautiful garden pond. The most beautiful type of pond plants are lilies. Water lettuce and water hyacinths are also excellent additions to the pond and submerged plants such as Hornwort, Vallisneria, Sagitarria, Cabomba and Anacharis are also excellent. The ideal pond fish are common or hardy goldfish.

Pond Depth

Dear Pond Lady,
We live in Pennsylvania and it does get pretty cold here in the winter. We are planning to build our first lily pond this summer, and haven't a clue. The info we've gotten from you, so far is the best of any we've seen.

Pondlady sez:
In the South, we recommend that the pond be 18” deep. This depth is ideal for plants and fish. In the north, the pond must be deeper because your weather is colder and the pond can freeze solid. Your pond's deepest point should be below the frost line. That the depth where the ground freezes solid in the winter, and therefore, so does your pond.
I always recommend that you get in touch with your local extension service, university, or aquaculture organization to find out the optimum depth in your area.

Potting up Plants

Pot up all the plants in heavy topsoil...no potting soil or anything with
vermiculite or perlite in it. That stuff will float all over the water and is almost impossible to net out. Then cover the top with sand or pebbles, so the soil won't float out. Most aquatic plants want to have about 1" of water over the tops of the pots.


When you pot up a water lily, put the water lily corm in the pot so the top of the corm sticks a bit out of the sand or other medium. Start feeding the lilly when the leaves reach the top of the water. The water lily wants to be at least 6-12" below the surface of the water.