new pond questions

Hello,

I have a relatively new (1 week) pond/water garden that I've got up and
running. It's basically an above ground 3x3x2 box lined with pond
linter. One corner has a shelf with gravel and rocks and a fountain
that spills water out over the rocks. So far we have 3 goldfish and a
variety of plants in there. We have 4 floating plants (watter lettuce
types), 5 submerged plants (anacharis and related) and 4 marginal
plants up on the shelf (2 dwarf lillies and 2 grass type plants I can't
recall what they are). I have a small water lilly on the way as well.

Filter wise, we have one of those submersible filter boxes (2 different
mesh pads and bio-balls) with a pump inside it. We have around 120
gallons and the filter moves about 200 gallons an hour, and with
something this small I hope the simple filter is adequate.

Everything is up and running and quite nicely, but I have a few
questions about the setup...

1) Our filter has pads and bio-balls, but should I put in any
biological starter or anything, or should it be ok?

2) I didn't do a good enough job (apparently) of washing the pea gravel
and stones before putting them in, so our water has been pretty cloudy
(all dirt and sand, not algae). Is there anything I can do about this
or just wait it out and eventually the filter will get it? I was
thinking that maybe some of the accu-clear would help to get the sand
and dirt out, but I'm not sure.

3) Our marginal plants are a few inches deep on a small shelf. For the
time being, to keep them alive until we figure out what to do with
them, we put some soil in landscape fabric and made a little bag over
the root ball tied up with string. I assume this won't work long term,
but I'm unsure wha to do with them. Most websites seem to suggest using
large pots for the marginals, but our shelf is only 4" underwater and
isn't really that large, so we couldn't fit an 8" pot in there. I've
also read some suggestions to just embed them in the pea gravel and
they'll be fine. Any advice on what to do with them?

A picture can be seen at
http://www.math.ohio-state.edu/~ccunning/garden.jpg to get an idea of
where the marginals are.

wrote in message
oups.com...

Hello,
A picture can be seen at
http://www.math.ohio-state.edu/~ccunning/garden.jpg to get an idea of
where the marginals are.
===============================
I hope shade isn't going to be your problem. It appears the pond is under a
roof of some kind. Also, those plants will get big and need a deeper shelf
in time. Just my opinion. :-)
--
McKoi.... the frugal ponder...
EVERYONE: "Please check people's headers for forgeries
before flushing." NAMES ARE BEING FORGED.
Do not feed the trolls.
~~~ }((((o ~~~ }{{{{o ~~~ }(((((o

No, that picture is just deceptive, it was taken early this morning and
it's all shaded from the house. The posts behind it are actually
arbors, which provide very little shade to the pond. Right now in
summer the water will get unobstructed direct sunlight from about 10am
to 7 pm.

As for the shelf, that's kind of what I was thinking. I am thinking
perhaps what we will need to do is stack some bricks to put the plants
right in front of the shelf. The shelf itself is 5" or so deep, but
that's not really deep enough if we are going to put the plants in
pots... Hence my wondering if we could just put them in gravel or what
alternatives there may be. I could lower the shelf but it would be a
lot of work

wrote in message
oups.com...

No, that picture is just deceptive, it was taken early this morning and
it's all shaded from the house. The posts behind it are actually
arbors, which provide very little shade to the pond. Right now in
summer the water will get unobstructed direct sunlight from about 10am
to 7 pm.

$$ Oh, I see. :-)

As for the shelf, that's kind of what I was thinking. I am thinking
perhaps what we will need to do is stack some bricks to put the plants
right in front of the shelf. The shelf itself is 5" or so deep, but
that's not really deep enough if we are going to put the plants in
pots... Hence my wondering if we could just put them in gravel or what
alternatives there may be. I could lower the shelf but it would be a
lot of work

$$ Yes, I had plants living right in fine gravel in my 800 gallon pond at
one time. They grew like crazy!
--
McKoi.... the frugal ponder...
EVERYONE: "Please check people's headers for forgeries
before flushing." NAMES ARE BEING FORGED.
Do not feed the trolls.
~~~ }((((o ~~~ }{{{{o ~~~ }(((((o

$$ Yes, I had plants living right in fine gravel in my 800 gallon pond at
one time. They grew like crazy!

I might have to give that a go then, I am thinking maybe take one and
see how it does for a few weeks so in case it doesn't make it I can
always split the other one. I suspect whether it will grow in the
gravel depends on the type of plant too. Did you add any liquid
fertilizer to the water, or does the fish poop feed it enough?

wrote in message
oups.com...

$$ Yes, I had plants living right in fine gravel in my 800 gallon pond
at
one time. They grew like crazy!

I might have to give that a go then, I am thinking maybe take one and
see how it does for a few weeks so in case it doesn't make it I can
always split the other one. I suspect whether it will grow in the
gravel depends on the type of plant too. Did you add any liquid
fertilizer to the water, or does the fish poop feed it enough?
======================
This is true as some plants just don't thrive in gravel, especially the
larger gravel. Water lilies are one of them for example. The gravel I used
was fine and detritus would collect and I assume "feed" the plants. The
only fertilizers I use are Potash, Iron and Magnesium. The fish supply the
rest. All plants in my experience will do better (be taller and larger in
general) planted in clay soil but will grow and reproduce in fine gravel
nonetheless.

Those I found do well in fine gravel are water iris, pickerel weed, parrots
feather, elodia, sweet-flag and a few others I forgot the names of....
--
McKoi.... the frugal ponder...
EVERYONE: "Please check people's headers for forgeries
before flushing." NAMES ARE BEING FORGED.
Do not feed the trolls.
~~~ }((((o ~~~ }{{{{o ~~~ }(((((o

Very cute little pondlet in what looks like a neat
garden structure.

One thing about water plants, is given enough
sun, they will GROW. I think this year you'll find
out what works and what doesn't work in your
pond and then adjust accordingly.

Don't add any more fish and buy a test kit to
watch the water parameters.

It will be fun to watch it thru the summer.

athy :-) www.blogfromthebog.com
this week ~ a snake story

Pond 101 page for new pond keepers ~
http://hometown.aol.com/ka30p/myhomepage/garden.html

kathy wrote:
Very cute little pondlet in what looks like a neat
garden structure.

Thanks, it cost about 3x as much as expected and involved a lot of
sweat, but I'm happy with it

The complete structure looks like this:

http://www.math.ohio-state.edu/~ccunning/garden2.jpg

We're going to plant wheatgrass in the boxes for a nice green backdrop,
and in a few years the grapevines will be grown up the arbors as well.

One thing about water plants, is given enough
sun, they will GROW. I think this year you'll find
out what works and what doesn't work in your
pond and then adjust accordingly.

Yes, I expect so. I think we started off pretty conservatively, we have
a proper number of underwater anacharis to keep things clean. I think
the floating plants we got, we may have to ditch some. Can't remember
what they are exactly, but they said that if we bunch them together
with some twine they will sprout up and bloom rather than spread out.

The water lilly on the way grows to 12-18" in diameter, so it should be
a good size and give nice shade.

If I had it to do all over, I'd put a shelf all along the outside for
more plants or rocks. Because of the odd shape, you can see a lot of
bunching along the edges which makes me crazy

Don't add any more fish and buy a test kit to
watch the water parameters.

Nope, no more fish, just the 3. We expect as they grow we might lose
one, we'll see. I'm not sure how a goldfish can live in a tiny bowl but
3 in our relatively big container might be a bit crowded, but I guess
the goldfish in tiny bowl rarely lives very long, so that's probably
the answer there

It will be fun to watch it thru the summer.

I'm very excited to watch it Even better, the sound of the water
helps to mask the sound of traffic in the grocery store right behind
us.

wrote in message
oups.com...


kathy wrote:
Very cute little pondlet in what looks like a neat
garden structure.

Thanks, it cost about 3x as much as expected and involved a lot of
sweat, but I'm happy with it

The complete structure looks like this:

http://www.math.ohio-state.edu/~ccunning/garden2.jpg
===========================
Your yard is large enough for a nice inground pond. :-) Say about 2 to
3000 gallons and some koi.....
--
McKoi.... the frugal ponder...
EVERYONE: "Please check people's headers for forgeries
before flushing." NAMES ARE BEING FORGED.
Do not feed the trolls.
~~~ }((((o ~~~ }{{{{o ~~~ }(((((o

wrote:

kathy wrote:


Very cute little pondlet in what looks like a neat
garden structure.



Thanks, it cost about 3x as much as expected and involved a lot of
sweat, but I'm happy with it

The complete structure looks like this:



VERY Nice! Good job! :-)

http://www.math.ohio-state.edu/~ccunning/garden2.jpg

We're going to plant wheatgrass in the boxes for a nice green backdrop,
and in a few years the grapevines will be grown up the arbors as well.



One thing about water plants, is given enough
sun, they will GROW. I think this year you'll find
out what works and what doesn't work in your
pond and then adjust accordingly.



Yes, I expect so. I think we started off pretty conservatively, we have
a proper number of underwater anacharis to keep things clean. I think
the floating plants we got, we may have to ditch some. Can't remember
what they are exactly, but they said that if we bunch them together
with some twine they will sprout up and bloom rather than spread out.

The water lilly on the way grows to 12-18" in diameter, so it should be
a good size and give nice shade.

If I had it to do all over, I'd put a shelf all along the outside for
more plants or rocks. Because of the odd shape, you can see a lot of
bunching along the edges which makes me crazy


Don't add any more fish and buy a test kit to
watch the water parameters.



Nope, no more fish, just the 3. We expect as they grow we might lose
one, we'll see. I'm not sure how a goldfish can live in a tiny bowl but
3 in our relatively big container might be a bit crowded, but I guess
the goldfish in tiny bowl rarely lives very long, so that's probably
the answer there



It will be fun to watch it thru the summer.



I'm very excited to watch it Even better, the sound of the water
helps to mask the sound of traffic in the grocery store right behind
us.