Caring for aquatic pond plantsWritten by Brett Fogle
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Tropical lilies won’t survive winter and are often treated as annuals, discarded in autumn. Some water gardeners have saved tropical lilies by storing them in peat moss. Trim off leaves and roots and cover rhizomes in a tray of damp (not wet) peat moss. The peat moss has antiseptic properties and helps inhibit rotting of rhizome. The tray of peat moss should be kept in a cool basement or garage and sprayed with water periodically to prevent drying out. Inexpensive submerged plants, such as Elodea, Anachris and Cabomba should be discarded as well as floating plants like water lettuce, and water hyacinths.
*********************************************************** Brett Fogle is the owner of MacArthur Water Gardens and several pond-related websites. He also publishes a free monthly newsletter called PondStuff! with a reader circulation of over 6,000 pond owners. To sign up for the free newsletter and receive a complimentary 'New Pond Owners Guide' for joining, visit MacArthur Water Gardens
| | How to Choose between Goldfish and KOIWritten by Brett Fogle
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Pond Goldfish Japanese KOI on other hand, and especially larger ones, will often create a huge mess out of submerged potted plants. They seem to enjoy 'digging' in soil of plants and sometimes even knocking them over. This all leads to added mess in pond, and can create a real problem for pond owner. Generally, it's best to not have submerged plants in large pots, when also keeping KOI. The ideal KOI pond is much deeper than average water garden, so necessity for plants to help with water quality and shade is reduced. However, if you still do want to keep potted plants in your KOI pond, we recommend wrapping netting over tops of pots, to keep fish from digging in pots. Another thing you can do is to top pots with 1" of pea gravel, and then larger river stones or similar over that. The KOI will not be able to get past larger rocks. As far as mixing Goldfish with KOI, this is fine and very common, we've just tried to highlight most important differences between two and between average water garden and KOI pond. Feel free to experiment with both, and then decide which fish is more to your liking.
*********************************************************** Brett Fogle is the owner of MacArthur Water Gardens and several pond-related websites. He also publishes a free monthly newsletter called PondStuff! with a reader circulation of over 6,000 pond owners. To sign up for the free newsletter and receive a complimentary 'New Pond Owners Guide' for joining, visit MacArthur Water Gardens
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