How Many Pond Fish Are Too Many?

Are you devoting time, resources and effort in developing a pond for your garden? If so, after all of that time, exertion and hard work required to create your pond, it is now time for you to invest in fish for it.

This can be the most exciting part of the entire project. Before you run out and purchase an assortment of fish, you must know approximately how many fish you should include in your pond, and how many fish are too many.

Actually, there are several factors you should consider before making a decision on the amount of fish you will need for your pond. A couple of factors you must consider are the fish sizes, the gallons of water you have in your pond, and how strong your pond's filter is.

There are formulas you can use to assist you with making the decision. For instance, the standard formula that states per square footage of the pond water, you should have one inch of fish. Using this formula, hundred (100) inches of fish is appropriate for a 10 foot square pond.

This formula is easy to use, but even with this formula the waste fish create is not taken into consideration. A fish of one-twelfth an inch is equivalent to four three inch fish, according to our old formula. This calculation is incorrect in that twelve inch fish will soon weigh about 475 grams and the four three inch fish will soon weigh approximately 29 grams.

There is a huge difference! It is best for you to consider the waste of the fish that can be generated each day. You need to bear in mind that you have to take into account there will produce nearly one-third of its weight each day. Approximately 158 grams of fish waste each day is what your pond will filter from the twelve inch fish.

This simply means that if you have a small or medium sized pond, acquiring lots of small fish is much better than a few large fish. Even if you consider small fish for your pond, you must not overload it with too many fish.

If you have three feet of space in your pond, you can include 60 inches or 10 actual goldfish. Be sure you have a strong and tough filter in your pond. The filter plays a large role in the lifespan of your fish.

There is a more popular rule you can use in place of the old formula. This rule is frequently uses by several koi fish experts. This rules states that per square footage of surface area, there should be 1/2" of koi. You can include four twelve inch koi fish in your 10x10 foot pond at home. You must also take into consideration that koi grow much larger than goldfish, and are a tad bit messier than goldfish.

If you are lucky to have a new pond at your home, never overload the pond with too many fish all at once. Overloading your pond can destroy your natural filter, increase your ammonia spike, and increase the risk of killing all of your new fish.

It is best to add your new fish to the pond sparingly. Include only one or two new fish and allow the fish to adjust to the pond for nearly two weeks or more before adding additional fish to your pond. Because the pond is an environmental system, you will need to allocate

Pamella A Neely writes about ponds [http://buildagardenpond.com/], how to build a pond [http://buildagardenpond.com/] and how to care for existing ponds.