Fish Care Tips

Bringing fish home to place in your pond or water garden takes as much planning and care as bringing a new plant home. But with the right know-how, fish care is simple and your fish will be happy and keep your garden company for a long time.

It Takes Time To Adjust

When you arrive home with your new fish, place them while they’re still in their bag into the pond or water garden for a minimum of 1 hour or until the temperature of the water in their bag is similar to the water in their new home. Ideal water temperature for your new fish is around 60° Fahrenheit. However, they can handle short-term ranges of 40 to 80° F.

Add a dash of Aqua Safe NH/CL or Stress Coat to the pond. Stress Coat contains aloe vera and helps to maintain a healthy slime layer on your fish. Stress can reduce this layer and the health of your fish can be affected.

Do not feed your new fish for the first 2-3 days, then only feed them what they can eat in a 5-minute period. Overfeeding can cause problems with your water quality and fish. Also know that they do like to eat more often in the summer. We recommend Misty Mountain Koi Food for all types of fish and an occasional lettuce leaf, watercress, or brown bread treat.

Water quality is essential to the health of your fish. Ideally, you should test your pond’s ammonia level weekly for the first few months. High ammonia levels are usually the result of excess food debris and fish dropping build up and are toxic to fish and can result in disease and death. If your levels test high, you should begin to do 20% to 40% water changes each day until those levels drop back to a safe range. After each water change, reapply a dose of Aqua Safe NH/CL or Stress Coat.

Special Koi Fish Care Notes: Try not to use a fish net when moving koi. Their scales are very sensitive and can be damaged. Use the net to encourage or herd them into another container. Koi like to jump, especially their first few days in a new home. Keep an eye on them as they may jump out of the water entirely.

Calculating Pool Water

1. Pool Volume:
   1. Rectangle: Volume in cubic feet = length x width x depth [ ]
   2. Circle: Volume in cubic feet = 3.14 x pool radius x pool radius x depth [ ]
   3. Oval: Volume in cubic feet = 3.14 x (½ width x ½ length x depth)  [
2. The number of gallons in the pond equals the volume of the pool in cubic feet multiplied by 7.5.

Note: All dimensions are in feet. Also, the volume of water will be reduced by shelves, sloping sides, and containers of plants.

Saline Bath Formula: Use for ailing or stressed fish. Add rock salt at the rate of 2 lbs. per 100 gallons of water. DO NOT use rock salt if you are using Zeolite Rocks for filtration or with aquatic plants.