The Pond Saga

I'm still not sure when it all started but somehow we have ended up with a huge pond in our backyard. For years the kids have swam in this large black (indestructible) stock pond that belonged to my in-laws. Our kids had outgrown it and having a community pool really made it obsolete. Chris had been wondering what to do with it so he decided to bury it in the ground and make a small pond out of it (remember that word small).

So we got our pool in the ground, Chris plugged a pump into and we even added a few Koi. We then started reading about Koi (always do this before digging random holes in your backyard) and we realized we needed our pond to be deeper for the winter months. Soooooo ...... Chris started digging again. This time he moved the Koi to a rubbermade bucket where one of them devised an escape plan that involved leaping from the bucket after a rainstorm. Obviously the little koi hadn't thought his plan completely out and we found him the next day on the sidewalk.

Chris dug a much deeper hole with several levels and filled that in with a black plastic sheeting. He made a huge mess while doing this and turned the water a dirty brown ( he thought his filter could handle it- it couldn't). He also added the koi back into the pond (1 original, 1 replacement) but since the water was so muddy we never saw them again along with a frog Chris tossed in that sunk straight to the bottom!!

After more research Chris realized he would need to pump all the water out and start over again. It took almost a whole day but he got all the water drained out (and into the neighbors yard). We were surprised to discover our 2 koi very much alive at the bottom of the muddy mess- no frog though.

Now with clean water in it and we started adding plants, rocks, and crushed granite around the pond. Chris also put 4 fish in this time- 2 koi and 2 goldfish which all promptly died.

We finally got the water balanced so I surprised Chris for his birthday and bought him 2 LARGE bright orange koi and put them in the pond. At that time I noticed the water had turned a very murky greenish color and I couldn't see the koi at all. This became quite the joke in the family as there was even doubt cast that I had bought Chris anything and just made up the fish since no one had ever seen them except me.

We finally fixed the green water and now the pond is wonderful. You can see the fish all the time, the lily pads are blooming like crazy and frogs no longer sink to the bottom.

I found this little pond on clearance at Walmart for $15- pump included! We have goldfish in it.