Pond is very silty after fish introduced.

Hi,

I have a small pond and have filled it 4 weeks ago. I have a few oxyginators in the pond and the water has been cyrstal clear. I put 6 gold fish into it yesterday and they seemed to be loving life exploring it for the first few hours. Then it started to get really silty and I can hardly even see the fish now. They seem to be sitting at the bottom not moving much.

Any tips to get the water clear again? Would the silt be bad for the fish?

You can see from the photos before and after fish.

 

I presume the fish are poking around in the sediment on the bottom.

All you can really do is leave it alone and hope it settles, you could have a problem with the water turning green in the next few weeks.

 

Is there anything I can do to sort this?

 

Not that I know of, fish will always poke around.

 

Give it a week or so and see what happens. If you only introduced the fish at the weekend they will still be settling in, hence the mad exploration period followed by the lurking at the bottom to recuperate. Hopefully as they settle in, the silt will too. They will continue to poke around a bit at the bottom - they are a type of carp, after all - but if you have enough oxygenators and other plants that will give them some cover and make them feel at home. I don't have any in my pond now - too attractive to herons - but the ones I had before behaved a bit like a herd of deer*, shy prey creatures who enjoyed exploring their 'forest' and sunning themselves when the opportunity offered, but were also quick to take alarm!

 

It looks like you allowed a lot of soil to collect in the pond, which without fish settled to the bottom.

Now the fish are in they are disturbing the silt.

The reason they are staying on the bottom is because there is no cover for them to venture near the surface.
This may naturally pass as they become more confident, but you could add a load of oxyenator plants that are available quite cheaply and other floating plants as they will help clear things and give them some cover.

You could also try one of the Flocculant Pond Carifiers to see if that helps reduce the cloudiness, though not something we have ever used.
A filter unit would help but looks like you are just keeping it natural.

 

Thanks for the replies everyone. Yes I'm trying to keep its as natural as possible, fish weren't really something I thought much about until my kids pestered me into it.

Another question about feeding the fish. When I sprinkle the flakes the fish don't see the food and it disolves into the water. When the water was clear they came straight up to munch on it. Will they not starve?

 

If concerned you could get some mini pellets instead of the flake, they should not disolve as quickly.

Most fish are generally overfed so would not worry about them not seeing the food, they smell it just as much as seeing it.

Your potted plants , did you cover the soil up with a good layer of pea gravel or similar ? otherwise the soil will continue to leach into the water and the fish will grub into the soil looking for food , compounding the issue.

 

When I had my pond I'd Hoover the bottom with an old wet & dry vacuum cleaner 2 or 3 times a year.