Grow Your Own Magazine

I think a space for" wild"ponds could be in keeping with,as has already been observed , organic control methods.As a fish keeper of over forty years I would however urge the rest of the thread,that they get a dedicated fish keeping magazine before entering into the water butt scenario,I envisage a lot of dead gold fish if they aren't kept properly.Water quality is something of a science if fish are to live and thrive rather than just survive.

Hi All,

we have a decent sized back yard, with raised bed borders, but not much free ground space, and a toddler, so need something safe. I'd like to 'create' a small wildlife pond in a half barrel, lining it with some pond liner, to encourage slug-eating beasties into the garden (if it works well, I may do the same up at my lottie.) I suppose it would be best to wait till spring, set it up, fill it with water from my butt, then go frog / toad spawn hunting? When does spawning usually occur (we live in a village near Consett in Co Durham)

Any suggestions for plants, tips for getting it up & running successfully, anything really - this is my first water adventure, advice appreciated!

Thanks

Vik

The thing is if you use your half barrel above ground you could end up with a tub of warm green"soup" and no wild life in it.
Burried to near ground level and put in some "oxygenator weed" from your local supplier and watch to see what happens.You could add a small water lily as this shades the water and stops the algae bloom that turns the water green.Make sure that anything that falls in it could get out again,put a piece of wood or stone so that things can climb out(hedgehogs have a habit of this,though they can swim,they could get exhausted),I even found a dead Barn Owl in a small cattle drink vessel once,I guess it fell in having a drink and couldn't get out again.Finally I would not recommend fish unless you are going to add a powered filter of some kind,personally I think wild life in a natural pond and fish in a properly maintained environment.

Because of your toddler I would cover most of the surface with a very strong mesh. Accidents do happen and it is better to be safer than sorry.

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Yes please to having a section on pond, ect. and it is definatly grow your own as frogs need ponds to live in and they eat slugs! Goldfish do live happerly outside all year round, but i don`t like the idea of keeping them in a water but. I think they could pollute the water.

There have been several threads about ponds and wildlife so a seperate section would be good. That said in spring when the frogs etc get going in mine it will probably be classified as wildlife porn and get banned

LOL! I felt like a voyeur back in the Spring watching the frogs 'at it'! As a novice I began counting them, then realised for every one I counted, it was actually 2!!

I'll second/third/4th/5th whatever a spot on water/nature gardening, maybe one for all kinds of livestock/animals (or am I going a bit far? GYO used to have a smallholders section in it, really miss it in the mag).
On goldfish, my mum has a small pond in her garden (Dumfriesshire) with petshop bought goldfish in it. They are doing so well they breed every year and she has to give them away. I'd maybe wrap lots of insulation around the water butt n if it gets really cold think about taking them in, don't know how cold it gets where you are. Love the idea of fish in the water butt though, my OH won't let me have a pond but I could maybe do something with this. BTW plants lurv the water n fish poop from my tank in the house, never need to use fertilizers, hear its very high in nitrogen n garden centres are charging people for the stuff now.

We had fish in the garden pond - goldfish, shubunkins and fantails which lived out in the cold pondwater all year round. My dad would put some boards across one end to keep it slightly warmer. Any ice that formed overnight was broken. Also we used, say a floating plastic ball, to keep the pond from freezing totally over.
One day, we noticed little fishies - the big fishies had been "naughty" - the little fishies thrived.
As soon as froggies saw me - they would disappear. Guess they weren't prince material then!

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Yes please to a section on Ponds and planting for ponds. I couldn't contribute any advise but would read each post avidly as have just had pond built around decking. It's got a little fountain at one end which then runs into another bit that then goes under the decking and then there's a deep bit for fish on the other side. It's got a powerful pump & filter that's been sunk into the ground and you just pull the top off, attach a hose and you can water your veg's with all the fish poo (so the man in the shop says. Is he right? Would it act as a fertiliser or would it introduce bacteria? Haven't bought any fish yet as advised to wait for the spring. Has planting beds alongside too and I don't have a clue which plants to get. Feel I should do some serious reading but far too wrapped up in reading about growing veggies. All I know is we want lots of frogs!

I wonder if you could eat them?

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Kindest regards, David.

http://pigletsplots.blogspot.com/
updated - Sunday 19th at 2100hrs

Hi Piglet,
This is an obvious answer, but I chuckled - One may get caught in your throat which would mean you'd have a frog in your throat! Oh never mind!!
Bestest
Weavie