f1ea

Hello all,

Here's a bit of sharing of our ongoing project at my father in law's mountain cabin:

- NATURAL pond (about 15,000 Gals). All we did was Dam it.
- All plants naturally occurring. Too many to mention right now, but I will update as i make/discover the species list.
- Filtration: natural SPRING water from an actual mountain spring. Released water ends up in the river downstream.
- Water Temperature: about 72F in summer, 65F in winter @ about 1,200 m a.s.l. (will have to check and confirm these numbers)
- Fish: Goldfish
- Climate: Tropical Rainforest ("Bosque Humedo Tropical"). It rains pretty much every day.
- pH, Ammonia, Nitrites: LOL
- More details to follow as things move on......

Here are pics of the pond and surroundings.
Enjoy nature's aquascaping techniques!

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Veloth

Very nice pond.

Karebear

Wow! I think I have found paradise, wonderful pond! Keep us updated

RoseyD

Wow! who needs fishtanks when you can have that!

Beautiful! Now that's a wonderful place to call home. 65-72 year round ... yeah - that's paradise.

f1ea

Thanks for the replies... the truth is that place is wonderful. The climate and landscape are perfect!
(by the way, water flows out from the spring a few degrees colder than ambient temperature. Ambient is like 76 F in the summer daytime and 68 F in Winter daytime). We try to go as often as posible, although its a couple of hours from home... but going there is instant stress-relief.

In a couple of weeks, we'll bring lots of Goldfish... and maybe some easy reproducing fellas to provide some food... Right now it only has about 10 Koi's/carps. Other adjustments will be adding some nice river rocks for hardscape, and planting some marginal plants around the banks to protect them from heavy rains.

I'll post more pics as it evolves and hopefully we'll all learn a lot by watching nature do her job...

Regards

Tentacles

It looks wonderful.

You know, in NZ goldfish and carp have flooded out of so many closed systems they now compete with native fish and are a bit of a pest. It'd be nice if you could get some native species in your pond just from an environmental impact point of view, in case of a flood, and also, if you get too many, you could restock local waterways.

Karebear

I agree completly with tentacles, and you could go fishing in your back yard!

f1ea

Thanks.
But I think the river downstream is way too fast for goldfish to thrive... Also, because the pond is high up in the mountains, it rarely floods (small catchment / fast draining system). One thing i could do is place a net concealed somewhere dowsntream before reaching the river, that way any fish that flow out could be transferred back to the pond...

And to be honest... i've never seen a fish in that part of the river!

tug

I like the point Tentacles and Karebear make about the environmental impact of carp. There are natural/native choices for your area that might need looking at. Sorry, but its just a fish pond stocked with non-native species. However, the adjective "extreme" certainly fits.Maybe your just the one to help bring back some long lost native fish species.

f1ea

You mean it isnt an NPT??
OK, it's a Naturally Planted Pond... an NPP

About native species... it would make little point to make a natural pond 'themed' about it... why not just sit and watch them at the river? but like i said, i have never seen a native fish in over 4yrs in this area.

But here's a list about our native fish:
http://fish.mongabay.com/data/Dominican_Republic.htm

hmmm Maybe i'll start a Native biotope... good idea! Research just started.

By the way... the pond is not immediately close to the river seen on the pictures. After the stream leaves leaves the pond, it seeps underground and re-surfaces at one of the river banks.