Just like our ponds...

[[-M_a_t_r_i_x-]]

This place really slooooows down for the winter. ;-)

[K30a]

It's supposed to get down to
20 tomorrow night! Frozen trick or
treaters! The teenagers think there
will be lots of leftover candy that will
need eating.
For winter ponding I set up a couple pondsills.
Here are some instructions for newbies.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

What you need is a really big jar. The kind you can buy on the bottom shelf at
the supermarket filled with pickles
or one of those warehouse food store chains. As long as it will fit on your
kitchen windowsill or
office windowsill - the idea is to get some winter sun. I added one of those
decorative shelves so
it is flush with the my narrow kitchen windowsill and gave myself more room.
So you've got your giant pickle jar, eat all the pickles.
Clean jar.
Fill the bottom with aquarium gravel to a depth of about one to two inches
(use the polished rock kind, the dyed stuff can be hard on some critters).
Add a couple pretty marbles, agates, glass florist stones or aquarium toys.
Right now I have a sunken and haunted Chinese junk in mine - Osama the leech
lives
in the Chinese junk from time to time.
Net up several strands of underwater plants and put in.
I use anacharis from my pond.
(You can buy underwater plants at a good pet store that sells
lots of fish.)
Add a pinch of pond slime.
Add pondwater.
Find a bunch of baby snails and drop in.
Net up two baby fish from the pond, the smaller the better.
Top with duckweed.
If you add an aquatic frog (pet store), put a piece of netting over the top,
they can pop out in pursuit of a freeze dried bloodworm. (I have found with a
top that curves in you don't have to worry about them escaping.)
Set in the window and feed very, very sparingly. Two flakes of goldfish food or
two koi kibbles ground up for the little fish. A couple freeze dried bloodworms
for aquatic frogs. Watch for fish eating the frog's bloodworms - if this
happens remove fish to their own pondsill.
Do water changes from time to time -
Use a turkey baster to suck up water and goop from the bottom and feed your
plants with it.
Or just dump everybody in a big mixing bowl, swish the gravel in a strainer,
refill
pondsill with fresh pond water and move the residents back in when the water
temps feel the same.
Do not use that turkey baster for Thanksgiving dinner, or at least don't tell
your
mother-in-law what you use it for in tending the pondsill.
The pondsill should balance itself and the larger the glass jar the better.




k30a

[Theo van Daele]

> Do not use that turkey baster for Thanksgiving dinner

LOL. I sometimes do wonder about you Kathy :D

[[-M_a_t_r_i_x-]]

For the bad neighborhood kids, I prefer bobbing or apples in the pond.
LOL You never see them again!
<evil grin>

[~ jan JJsPond.us]

It's just a momentary slow down when we put the ponds away for the winter.
Mine are all done now, what a chore as we went from sunny warm days, to
really cold days real fast this fall and I had the Demo pond plus mine own
ponds to do. Whew, I'm not getting any younger that is for sure. My hands
still hurt from gripping the shop vac! ~ jan
See my ponds thru the seasons and/or my filter design:
http://users.owt.com/jjspond/

~Keep 'em Defrosted~
Tri-Cities, WA Zone 7a
To e-mail see website

[BenignVanilla]

"K30a" > wrote in message
...
>
> It's supposed to get down to
> 20 tomorrow night! Frozen trick or
> treaters! The teenagers think there
> will be lots of leftover candy that will
> need eating.
> For winter ponding I set up a couple pondsills.
> Here are some instructions for newbies.
> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
>
> What you need is a really big jar. The kind you can buy on the bottom
shelf at
> the supermarket filled with pickles
<snip>

I just tossed one of these in the garbage yesterday. I read this post and
told my wife, I need to go fetch it from the garbage. She didn't even bat an
eye. I guess I am that far gone.

BV.

[K30a]

BV wrote >>I guess I am that far gone.<<

Yup!
Really interesting. I've done this for at least
five years. The snails get smaller and smaller.
I think I've bred a species of shetland snails.
I must be in my 100th generation of seed shrimp.
In the summer I'll go out and load up a turkey baster full of critters from the
frog bog and add to the pondsills.


k30a
http://www.geocities.com/watergardeninglabradors/home.html