The Fish Preferred Dirty Water

I have had a love hate relationship with my pond since the day it was created. Besides needing to be completely re-created at this point, I'm also having issues with keeping the water clean. I am not good at this kind of stuff. There's a reason we don't have a pool. I read what to do about algae problems, I buy things to take care of said problem, I toss them into the pond, and algae continues to grow all willy nilly like I did nothing about i.

I tend to get frustrated about this kind of stuff.

I also kind of quit buying and administering things since they don't seem to work anyway. Instead, I started doing exactly what the books and internets say not to do. I empty the pond, hose down the walls, and refill it with clean water again. I'm fortunate in that I have a small pond, otherwise this would be taxing on our well. I'm also fortunate in that my fish seem to thrive under the stress of monthly cleanings, because the books and internets say that it disturbs the balance of the delicate ecosystem living inside the pond and blah blah blah. Yet, the fish I currently own have been happily swimming in my pond for three years now. Or maybe just living in my pond. How does one know if a fish is happy? Does it smile? Mine do not. In fact, they mostly cringe at the sight of people because Micah still has a love of throwing random things at the fish, like rocks and golf balls and dog bones and fire wood and even dogs. 

Yeah, I'm pretty sure my fish aren't as happy as they could be. Poor fish.

When we came home from vacation, the pond was so green and thick with algae that it was hard to tell if we even had a pump in there, much less fish. It was time to clean it out. Yet despite cleaning, the water was still greenish. And then I remembered that Sam had bought me a UV filter for the pond last winter. I hunted that thing out, read instructions (which were very lacking in instructions) and hooked that thing up with Sam's help.

People, that pond has clearer water than runs out of the garden hose. That UV filter killed off the algae in just a few days, and the water has been crystal clear since. Our fish are none too happy that we can see them even if they are reposing on the pond bottom. I kind of like it, though. I rather enjoy seeing the fish. It beats fishing them out just to look at them.


1 comment:

wendy said...

Sounds like my pond! I never thought to get a filter, will be looking up one now though!