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Winter Pond Care for your Pond Wild Life

Life in a winter pond could be potentiality deadly for your fish and plants. You should start your winter care before the winter months come into season, this will be important so that your plants, the fish and the pond itself make it through the winter with out problems or damages.

In the fall is when you should start your winter care.

Stop fertilizing submerged plants about 3 weeks before the average frost date. In warm climates where frost is not a concern, stop fertilizing when the pond temperature falls below 60 degrees F.

Preparing for winter

You can start your winter planting a few months before winter. You can plant winter hawthorns in the water garden so that they will become established over the winter months and will bloom in the early spring months. The early months are also a time for winter planting, you need to divide and dig up plants that you want to move or take out of your pond water garden. If you have any tropical plants in your pond you will need to remove these for the winter. If you have sturdy or hardy plants they should be fine just keep an eye on the temperature of your water.

Plant Care

If you have container plants in or around your pond, you need to think about the containers your plants are in. Are they able to withstand freezing temperatures with out the possibility of breaking? If the containers are made out of ceramic or glass type material, you might need to bring them indoors so they won't break, split, or crack

Submerged plants that are hardy in the area may be left in the pond. More tender plants should be brought indoors. Reduced sunlight also means that plants stop growing and photosynthesizing, with plants dropping their leaves and dying back.

Fish Care

The pond is more balanced during the winter then the summer months it is not struggling to cope with the abundance of artificial food and a large population of feeding fish.

If you built your pond properly it will be deep enough to support your fish through the winter. They will go into hibernation. They will fold there fins in close to there body, they won't move but their senses will still be working. As the temperature of the winter pond drops the fish will move closer together where their bodies will be touching. The fish will not eat during the winter months.

Winter Pond Picture

Pond Ice

The cold water naturally holds lots of dissolved oxygen. Since the fish are not eating there's no waste for the micro-organisms to break down. You don't want the ice to cover the whole surface of your pond. The carbon dioxide needs a way to escape out of the water. If your pond has ice on out you will need to breakthrough it. Allowing the sunlight to heat just a bit of the ice will help.

Remember, your fish are in a state of hibernation, you don't want to smash the ice or it will cause your fish to go into shock. The best methods for the winter pond are to use a pond heather to keep a hole open, or pour steaming hot water in top of the ice to melt it away.

Remember, your winter pond will always be full of life even when it looks as if everything has expired. The life is under the water and it is vital for your pond to keep it that way.

Biofilter

A mature biofilter is one of your ponds greatest assets. It is essential for maintaining a good, stable pond environment. During the winter your fish and plants will not need the biofilter to sustain them.

You want to keep the beneficial filter bacteria alive so it can do its job during the summer months. It is best to keep water running throughout it but, there is a risk to your winter pond in doing so.

It can chill the water, which in turn makes the whole pond cooler, and that is risky for the health of your fish. A useful compromise is to put a reduced flow of water through the filter as well as insulate it so that the water doesn't get chilled. But at all cost keep your filter alive.

Winter Pond Pictrues

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Winter Pond beginning

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