Hi everyone, I'm a new member to the forum but have been reading posts on here since last summer when I entered the exciting world of pond keeping! Tons of useful info so I'm hoping some of you much more experienced people can help me out. We recently had a Koi death which was pretty sad. Actually we also lost five fish over winter (two goldies, two sarasa comets and a shubunkin). I was away for the entire period (it's at my parents house so they were in charge!) but apparently there was only one body found. We had a net over the pond so I'm not sure how the others could have vanished. Any ideas? I recently read that most people turn off their filters over winter as otherwise the water temp drops too far. We left it running full time (it's an Oase Filtoclear 15000 and Aquamax Eco 12000 so the economy function slows it down in cold weather). Should we have stopped it? If so, do you need to clean it out/restart the bacteria when you turn it back on? Other than that I don't think we did anything wrong. We slowed feeding (using wheatgerm) during September/October when it started to get colder then stopped altogether around November time. The running water would have kept a break in the ice. When I got back home and we uncovered the pond (April) there was a ton of blanketweed but the remaining fish seemed happy enough. We started feeding again about a month ago. There was no easy way to get the blanketweed out so I did a full water change yesterday and took everything out (why did I put so much gravel in the bottom!). At the time one of my Koi (Goldilocks for obvious reasons) seemed very docile and was hanging around just under the surface. He almost let me stroke him which was uncharacteristic and we noticed his tail looked damaged. I had to move all the fish (and four newts!) into temporary accommodation (using water from the pond) while I emptied the pond and cleaned it. When I was refilling the pond I checked on the fish and saw Goldilocks was lying on his side at the top. I thought he was probably on his way out so the stress of moving and different water temps could have finished him off. He was still breathing though so I quickly put him back in the pond. I know this probably wouldnt have helped but I couldnÂt think of anything else to do. I de-chlorinated the pond and added some biostart but didnÂt want to keep the rest of the fish in the "holding area" for any longer so dropped them all back in. Goldilocks never perked up and I took him out this morning, definitely not breathing anymore. I could see any other external damage apart from the tail but have taken some photos for your opinions. Is it fin rot and if so, how should I avoid it reoccurring? I dosed the new water with "Tetra Pond MediFin" and also "Bacterad Anti-Ulcer, Finrot & Flukes" treatment. Overkill perhaps but is that a bad thing? Anything else I should have used instead? Our pond is about 3000 litres (650 gallons) and has had the return pipe from the filter acting as a temporary waterfall/aerator until last week when I built a small waterfall. IÂm afraid I didnÂt test the levels before the water change. None of the fish we over 5", most were smaller. The remaining three are a little fantail nymph, a ghost koi, and a small shubunkin. I went to the trouble of re-potting all of the plants with hessian and gravel to stop them losing their soil. There was also a ton of sludge in the bottom of the pond, as well as the blanketweed. Is there a chemical/natural treatment to both problems that I can employ to save me the monumental task in future? It looks much better now but I donÂt want it to get so bad again. IÂve been thinking about a pond vacuum as well as multiple sludge buster & blanketweed treatments perhaps. At the moment weÂve only got a couple of barley straw bundles. IÂm not sure I should add all the gravel back in as it will make any cleaning harder in the future, although it looks nice and breaks up the liner. Sorry about the ridiculously long post and also for asking so many questions at once but I would be extremely grateful if you guys could help me out and try to make me a better pond keeper!

I bought my first 3 Sticklebacks about three years ago from a local Aquatic Centre...now, like Alison, I have loads! The Aquatic Centre informed me this year that legislation now states they can only sell aquarium bred Sticklebacks. Think this is meant to protect 'wild' Sticklebacks but unfortunately also means they can't buy/sell any bred in garden ponds....even mine who are all the progeny of aquarium bred Sticklebacks. (They had some last year) This may be one of the reasons they are now so difficult to find. Sue

Welcome to the joys of ponding, and thanks dampflippers for the reminders about daphnia etc.--I forgot they help with green water. You will tempted by all sorts of products promising wonderfully clear water and the like to improve your pond---spend the money on good native plants instead and trust nature to find the balance. And algae is food too, and if you are interested in wildlife in your pond then they do need places to hide and food to eat! So think of algae is something which is managed, rather than got rid of completely--and load of critters can live in a handful of blanketweed, especially at this time of year. Don't forget tapwater is full of chemicals too so should be used sparingly and not seen as 'fresh'. I have a water butt not too far from the pond which I use to top up in warm weather, and only use tapwater if I have to. One big mistake I made early on was using a cement brick to weigh down some plants--the cement is to healthy pond water what kryponite is to superman!! The plants hated it and turned yellow and I did have to work hard to get the PH back to normality. Go out with a torch at night (watch where you step), and you will really get to see what is in there, and also that you are seeing only the tip of the iceberg so to speak! The longer you look at a clump of weeds for example, the more you can see what is very well hidden (caddis fly larvae, various bugs, tadpoles, snails eggs, very shy newts--perhaps not newts if you have fish-- dragon fly nymphs, tadpoles and the like.) I have had very good plants from bromfield aquatics--they are small to begin with but have grown better than more expensive bigger plants from garden centres. Just make sure you know when they are being delivered and arrange for the plants to not taken back to the depot--that happened to me and I had goo 5 days later!! Indeed, always have had better luck with younger smaller plants no matter the source. So enjoy your pond, be patient, and don't fiddle too much with mother nature!!

I think I am still a big kid as well. I love going on the swings at the playground and when the little fair comes to Lotherton Hall I go into the teacups as they are like little waltzers for children. Luckily I have the grandchildren to make it look 'normal'. As to our other problem we have now signed up with another company and have asked Streamline to pass over our details which of course they have not so now we have had to ask the new host to get the details for us but I don't understand all that. Sonny deals with everything. He is trying to recreate my website but of course all the work that I had done will have to be started again and it took ages to do. Tomorrow I am going to Citizens advice to see how we stand in getting some of our money back so I will keep you informed. I can't believe it really and just hope that people won't have deserted us but will look again in a week or so and find us back up and running. Kew Gardens is so expensive for it's entrance fee. I thought Castle Howard was dear at about £7 last time. They will soon price themselves out of ordinary peoples pockets. I know they have wages to pay etc but it puts us off going. I am lucky that at Lotherton Hall and Temple Newsam estate it is free. You pay to go round the house and at Lotherton you pay £3.50 parking but I have a yearly ticket which pays for itself if you go more often than 4 times a year.It also entitles me a free visit into the house every time I go. It is lovely there with a deer park, bird garden, pond and formal gardens and a playground for the children. Both houses are about £3.00 entrance fee and at Temple newsam there is a rare breed farm, lakes, rose garden, woodland walks and open land. Capability Brown made the gardens at the price of £2000 I think and had originally put in more lakes in the plans but they only did 2. I think they ran out of money.