Plants / Tips to shelter fry

[David Sim]

Hi

I want to give any fry that appear this year the best chance of survival I
can in their natural habitat of the pond. I'm not looking to farm hundreds
of little ones but a few more than last year would be nice.

I was wondering if anyone could recommend any plants that would give them
suitable shelter & cover - or any other tips !

The pond is in Berkshire UK and is 2500 gls and 5 ft deep (at it's deepest
part). It was built primarily for Koi so I don't want to / can't pack it
full of foliage, although at the moment there are only a couple of small
Koi, 30 odd goldfish & a couple of Shubies.

The plan is to up the Koi population in the Summer

Thanks chaps

David

[Koi-Lo]

"David Sim" > wrote in message
...
> Hi
>
> I want to give any fry that appear this year the best chance of survival I
> can in their natural habitat of the pond. I'm not looking to farm hundreds
> of little ones but a few more than last year would be nice.
>
> I was wondering if anyone could recommend any plants that would give them
> suitable shelter & cover - or any other tips !

Drop handfuls of hornwart among the other plants. Add water lettuce and
hyacinth among the plants as well. The roots of water iris over running
their pots also give the fry hiding and feeding places. And the greener the
water the better the fry do and the more that will survive.

> The pond is in Berkshire UK and is 2500 gls and 5 ft deep (at it's deepest
> part). It was built primarily for Koi so I don't want to / can't pack it
> full of foliage, although at the moment there are only a couple of small
> Koi, 30 odd goldfish & a couple of Shubies.

You have a lot of GF in this pond. If you want to save koi fry you need to
load at least one area with plants, the shallowest area, and perhaps remove
some GF as they avidly eat eggs.

> The plan is to up the Koi population in the Summer

I would suggest you remove the less attractive GF and add a lot more plants,
including floating plants as soon as your frost date passes.
--
Koi-Lo.... frugal ponding since 1995...
Aquariums since 1952
My Pond & Aquarium Pages:
http://tinyurl.com/9do58
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