Welcome!!! Your pond sounds absolutely beautiful and yes pictures would be
appreciated. www.flickr.com is an easy site to post pictures.

We have some very good fish experts in here and people from your area (the
sets are overlapping). My one bit of advice is don't over feed the fish. I
started my pond with feeder fish just to keep the mosquitoes down (or so I
told myself). They (or their offspring) are still with me well over a
decade later. I don't feed them at all in the winter and very little the
rest of the year. Your koi though will want food. We just had a long
thread on the best food for koi which should still be available to read.

Veggie filters are the best things for keeping the green fog away. There
are any number of ways you can add that to your pond. If your current
biofilter cannot handle the load with the koi, Jan has a wonderful bio
filter that I think is ideal for koi. http://www.jjspond.us:80/ and I
believe it also serves as a veggie filter. I know her pond looks crystal
clear (and is one of my favorites).

I am a really lazy ponder - everything I do is to make my pond and garden as
work free as possible. However I work on a far smaller scale than you so
my way of doing things would not work for you.

Look forward to the pictures! Donna

"RVentura" wrote in message
...
I'm Ray and with my wife Kath and children built a pond last year. My
guess is that it is about 2500 gals. It has a large rock border that rests
on a shelf about 2 inches under water and a plant shelf about 12 inches
under water. We wanted the bottom to be a haven for insect life and fish
eggs and whatever else could bring ecolological balance to the pond so
I've lined the bottom with river rock taken out of the ground when digging
the hole. I have a two foot high waterfall that splashes down two levels
(my attempt at aeration) and contains a biological filter that I have been
carfeul to "feed" (with MicrobeLift products) and not disturb. I have
started some lilies but have a fairly good growth of water hyacinth and I
think something called parrot fern.

I don't have a personal album online but could post a pic or two if
someone would like to suggest the easiest place to access.

I feel like I'm in an AA meeting when I confess that I couldn't wait to
get fish into the pond and had purchased several very small (1") goldfish
and some small (3") goldfish the second or third week after we'd filled
it. They survived the winter easily (we're located in Rancho
Cordova,California) and are still doing fine though now they're more like
5"- 7". Didn't know much (still don't really) about the care and feeding
of ponds and fish so fed them all winter. Sometime in spring a friend of
my son moved and gave us 6 10"-12" koi to care for, so I likely have too
many fish for the pond size I have water striders, dragonflies and damsel
flies in both final and larvae forms. The birds seem to like the free
bathing as I have put in some small beach access spots. Apart from bouts
with string algae and green water, the pond seems to be doing ok.

My biggest bother is that with our 100+ temperatures, the water goes
"green" and the bottom disappears. I see the fish at feeding time and an
occasional orange shadow beneath the surface at other times but I'd like
to see more of them. I have taken to treating the water with
MicrobeLift/SA but it's rather expensive and while it seems to block
enough light to inhibit string algae, it doesn't seem to have any effect
on the green water syndrone. I can tell from my skimmer filters that I am
getting a lot of the floating algae filtered out but obviously not enough
to clear the water. All submerged rocks are covered with this algae.A
local pond store suggests a UV light system. Has anyone experience with
these kinds of systems? They're a little dear but if they work against the
green water I would consider it.

I was also wondering if anyone knew the range of temperaturees that I
should try to keep the pond within. The water feels warm to my hand and I
just feel that can't be beneficial to the fish. We've been shading the
water with umbrellas because we're a new housing development and trees are
not big enough to do so yet. Would it be OK to cool the water down
somehow?

Thanks in advance for any replies and advice.