Using mud pond water to do water changes

[Fishbreeder]

Don't get me wrong, it'll work if you make it. If that is your only choice, well, make it work.

You just have to keep the potential problems in mind.

For many years all I had to work with was creek water. Raised a lot of fish in it, too. Hwever, I have engineered my own eventual demise by bringing the koi keeping hobby to all my neighbors. Now they purchase koi not only from me, but off the internet, at shows, and in town. My watershed is now peppered with koi from all over the world and I have shut down my creek pumps. I now use exclusively ground water from my wells. It costs over ten times as much as creek water.

A really big koi and goldfih farm on the East Coast uses exclusively surface water that has been sterilized for its operations, and it works quite well. After the initial cost of installation of sterilization gear, the water becomes very cheap indeed.

What I'd like to know is more about the chemistry and makeup of your mud pond water. Also what its source is and how often it is replenished.

Betya dollars to donuts I can figure a way to make that water useful.

Brett

[jacovors]

Hi Brett,

Thanks for the help.
I filled the pond with mains water and do a 30% change once a month. The pond bottom is solid yellow clay and I do not have a problem with loosing water through the bottom.
I also change 30% of my concrete pond water once a week using tap water. I just thought if I use raw mud pond water I could get the same results in my concrete pond and just add tapwater to the mud pond to fill it up again.
We do not have any limits on the amount of water we can use it is just a bit expensive. I cannot complain really since it has a hardness of 60ppm and a Ph of 7.8. Kh of 30ppm and no detectable Nitrite. :P

Thanks again
Jaco

[Fishbreeder]

If the only water coming into your mud pond would be city water and rainfall, you can just about eliminate worries about viral contamination as long as you aren't buying and putting new koi in that pond. Parasites and bacteria also become less of an issue.

I've seen many fish holding systems that worked from a mud pond water source. Basically a small mud pond serves as the "filter" for the system. You pump pond water to the tanks and drain the water from the tanks back to the pond. This works OK as long as its always the same fish in the tank and your mud pond is large enough to support the fish population in the tanks. Fish coming ang going (as in a holding facility) allows the mud pond part of the system to become contaminated with pathogens that then can spread back to the tanks with the water.

As long as the tanks (or koi pools) aren't getting fish coming and going through them to bring in pathogens, then the biggest problem becomes the muddy water. A settling tank might be all that would be required to address that. Pump your water change water to a big tank and let it set for a day or two, then put it in your pond. Do this by decanting the water from the top down and leaving the dregs to be washed away when you've finished.

Now, having done all that, I do not think you will be able to bring the benefits of the mud pond into the concrete one. I beleive you could not bring these benefits by pumping unfiltered water either. You might get some beneficial impact if the water chemistry of the mud pond is enhanced over that of the tapwater.



Brett

[shiromujigirl]

Isn't it more not so much the mud pond water but what they find to eat in it?

[Fishbreeder]

I think its both.

The koi "work the bottom" constantly seiving mud to get the "good stuff" out of it. I beleive they iingest lots of minerals like this. They also like to stick thier snouts into crawfish holes and pump the crawfish out with thier gills. Watching this behavior is quite interesting.

I beleive the koi smells a crawfish that has recently molted, they like softshells just like I do, but I want mine fried.Sometimes several koi will work one area, each with its head in the side of the pond. A big plume of really muddy water will be all around them. Unfortunately this behavior is really hard on the pond banks, undermining them and causing the tractor to fall into the pond on many occasions. The ponds must be reshaped every few years (as is done in Japan).

My koi get an amazing diversity of live foods, these change with the seasons and they feed heavily upon whatever is in abundance at the time. One favorite is mayflies. On the mornig after a big hatch, the yellow mayflies will be all over he pond's surface with the koi slurping them up, gorging until they are all gone.

On a windy summer's day they'll be right at the upwind edge waiting for a tasty morsel to blow in. A grasshopper is a favorite, but grass seeds, and other stuff is also eaten as it blows in.

A blustery early spring day finds the koi at the other end of the pond as the wind is now from the North and blowing in caterpillars from the trees. They eat the caterpillars as they hit the water.

A big rainstorm in late summer washes earthworms into the ponds by the thousands, koi there waiting as they wash in.

In most of my ponds, only about half of what the fish get to eat comes out of the feed bag.

Both the mud pond environment with its minerals and water quality as well as its natural foods contributes to the development of the koi.

However, koi do not finish up good in the mud. They need the closed environemtn in order to be brought fully into show form. Hence the need for both environments.