Considering a Tropical Pond

[Duncan6618]

duncan, have you considered a solar bubble heater/blanket? they use the sun to heat the water a bit and keep the heat from escaping. my dad has one on his pool and when you roll it off you can feel the heat. you might find one on craigslist for cheap.

about that heron: if the fake one doesn't work i've heard of people using mirrors facing up (spooks them), fake owls (some take batteries and have a motion sensor, they hoot and move their head) and if you want to spend a little more money, scarecrow sprinkler. good luck!

Yes, a pool blanket is next on my list if I need one. I was hoping to avoid using one since it will be a PITA to put it on and take it off every time the weather changes.

I have a dog that really hates birds, I think she is going to be spending more time outside this winter lol.

 

[Duncan6618]

Well the floating corrugated plastic idea is a bust. Plus as I put more on they prevent any surface skimming.

So I ordered a Thermal Anti-Condensate Greenhouse Film large enough to cover the entire pool. And I made pvc arches to make a little greenhouse over the pool. Hopefully this does the trick. Still waiting on the film to arrive but I'm almost done with the arches.

 

[Duncan6618]

I noticed the water coming out of the heater wasn't very warm even with a good fire burning. Well it turns out the 3" stove pipe was too small and keeping the fire from burning hot enough. So the coil was completely coated in thick creosote which was preventing heat transfer. So I replaced it with ac duct painted with bbq paint. The water coming out is much hotter now. I haven't measured the temp but it's jaccuzi hot so maybe 105F or more. And smoke no longer comes out of the front of the heater. There is actually a fire going in this pic but it burns so hot not that there is hardly any smoke.

I got the pond covered Sunday just before our strongest cold front of the year. It held up to 25 mph wind but needs to be tightened up again. The banana plant didn't fair as well lol.

It's only been a couple of days so I don't want to get too excited but I think I'll be going tropical .

I put a dot on the day I put the cover over the pond and I've only used the heater at night so it's looking good!

 

[Duncan6618]

So now I am thinking more about what to stock. Any suggestions are welcome.

Test fish in the pond now are:
1 - Albino Giant Gourami
1 - Oscar
4 - Gold Tinfoil barbs

In growout now:

1 - Arowana
4 - Oscars 2 albino, 2 tiger
6 - Redtail Tinfoil Barbs
2 - Ripsaw catfish (oxydoras niger)

I'm thinking 2 or 3 more arowana, 6-8 peacock bass, 2 tiger shovelnose, and somewhere down the road a redtail cat (I want to leave the redtail until last given their ridiculous growth rate).

Undecided List:
Arapaima (very tempting)
Paroon Shark

What else?

 

[Duncan6618]

Picked up 6 tiny monos today. They have a long way to go before they make it to the pond. Sorry this is best of the pics I took...

I also want to beef up the filtration in the spring since I will be having a huge bioload eventually. This is what I think I will end up doing...

This way if one pump goes out or some other issue, I will still have life support until I get it fixed. The protein skimmer will be a bit of an experiment.

 

[jonny5]

I skimmed through the thread and im not knowledgeable on how to economically heat a tropical pond in a temperate climate but I assume it is no easy task. I think the fact that you are able to create an outdoor tropical pond in the temperate/subtropical area is just so damn cool, I commend you sir.

 

[Pontis Lebowski]

Inspiring! Great work.

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[HyPHyISM42o]

nice

 

[Crisroom]

So now I am thinking more about what to stock. Any suggestions are welcome.

Test fish in the pond now are:
1 - Albino Giant Gourami
1 - Oscar
4 - Gold Tinfoil barbs

In growout now:

1 - Arowana
4 - Oscars 2 albino, 2 tiger
6 - Redtail Tinfoil Barbs
2 - Ripsaw catfish (oxydoras niger)

I'm thinking 2 or 3 more arowana, 6-8 peacock bass, 2 tiger shovelnose, and somewhere down the road a redtail cat (I want to leave the redtail until last given their ridiculous growth rate).

Undecided List:
Arapaima (very tempting)
Paroon Shark

What else?

You did an amazing job. Big props for sticking with it and not giving up.

I would personally stay away from any big cats. I know it's tempting but you will need to feed them a lot so other fish start disapearing. Go monster and add the pima!

 

[Chub_by]

Awesome that you are keeping it tropical. I'm just concerned that pbass won't make the low temps you get every once in a while.

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