Pond myths are stubborn. They get passed along between neighbors, repeated by people selling the wrong thing, and they end up costing homeowners money and fish. Here are the eight we hear most around Philadelphia, and what is actually true.
Myth 1: Put the pond in the lowest part of the yard
This is probably the worst place for it. The low spot is where runoff collects, and runoff carries lawn chemicals, fertilizer and silt straight into your water.
Put the pond where you will actually use it, near the house, the patio, the window you look out of. More on this in where should your pond go.
Myth 2: You have to drain and clean it regularly
Working with the biology rather than against it, a full cleanout happens once a year at most, in spring before the water warms. Draining a pond more often than that resets the bacterial colonies doing the actual work.
Myth 3: The more filtration the better
You can absolutely over filter a pond. Tight filter pads catch the finest particles, which means you are cleaning the filter constantly and stripping out material the ecosystem wants. Fish in the wild do not swim in bottled water. If you can see a dime on the bottom, your clarity is right.
Myth 4: You cannot be a koi keeper and a water gardener
You can have both. Koi grow just as large and stay just as healthy in a planted ecosystem pond as in a bare traditional koi pond. The trick is choosing plants that can hold their own, covered in keeping koi from eating your pond plants.
Myth 5: Rocks and gravel make a pond harder to clean
The opposite. Rock and gravel give aerobic bacteria somewhere to colonize, and that bacteria breaks down fish waste and debris that would otherwise become sludge on a bare liner. A gravel bottom looks better and lets the pond clean up after itself.
Myth 6: A koi pond has to be at least three feet deep
There are thousands of healthy two foot ponds around the country. Even in a cold winter a two foot pond generally only freezes about eight inches down, because the surrounding earth insulates it.
That said, depth buys you margin on temperature and on predators, and it is one of the decisions worth thinking hard about. See how deep should a koi pond be.
Myth 7: Koi cannot live in a pond with plants
In a balanced ecosystem koi and plants need each other. Fish feed on plants, fish produce waste, bacteria break the waste down, and the plants use the result as fertilizer. That loop is the pond working properly.
Myth 8: You have to bring the fish inside for winter
You do not. Fish come through the coldest winters fine given two feet of water, oxygenation, and a hole kept open in the ice so gases can escape. They do not starve under ice, they suffocate when the surface seals completely, which is what winterization prevents. Details in fall and winter services.
More on all of it in the complete koi care guide, or get in touch and we will answer whatever your neighbor told you.