fish

An automatic pond fish feeder provides supplemental feeding for fish in a pond. This pond feeder is needed to improve the health of pond fish and feeding fish supplements helps them grow and reproduce in a healthy manner. A wide range of automatic fish feeders is available in the market for all sizes of ponds and all types of pond fish.

Most people clearly know how to set up a dog space. They buy a 10 or 20 lb bag of kibble, a bowl for water, one for the kibble, and a doggie bed. Easy peasy. But going back in their memory banks to when mom brought that first goldfish in a bowl. You may remember the excitement. That is until about a month or so when "Moby Dick" was floating belly side up.

Whenever a fish is netted, bagged and shipped (or driven home) it is a highly stressful adventure for him. He loses his immunity to disease for about 72 hours after the trip. He is weaker than another fish that has not suffered through the same ordeal. During this stressful 72-hour period his general health and body system is at a critical low point.

Stress gives us headaches, makes us feel lousy, tears down our systems and causes heart attacks that can lead to death. We get our stress from missed deadlines, traffic, arguments, tragic events — you name it! We often ignore the warning signals and will live many years under stress.

If you’ve experienced an extraordinary amount of health problems with your koi and goldfish this year you needn’t feel alone. We’ve seen more ulcer disease, infestation of ich and flukes, internal infections and unaccountable deaths this year than ever before. Customers who have had the same healthy fish for years have been experiencing losses this season of 25% or more without having added new fish or doing anything out of the ordinary.

The call comes in. One of our customers is on the phone. His fish are acting strangely. Two of them are beating up on a third (poor fish) and he’s had one jump out of the pond. Fortunately it was found in time and survived the ordeal. There’s a strange foam on the water...

I know of people who feed their pond fish catfish food and even dog food. They smile and tell me how cheap these foods are and that their fish do just fine with them. This may be true — for a while. Eventually, however, the "cheap" ingredients in these foods will cause the fish to become obese and die.

Most folks are going to grab whatever is handiest and cheapest for the fish in their ponds. Little thought is given to what kind of food it is and for what purpose. The fact is ornamental pond fish really DO NEED to be fed because Mother Nature cannot supply worms through rubber liners. We, at Pond Doc’s, DO look at the label and size up just what the food does for the fish. Some brands are extremely poor quality and build fat on the fish. Yes, fish suffer from obesity just like humans do! Others are on the other end of the spectrum, supplying the equivalent of our steaks and caviar.

Many folks come into the store with desperate looks on their faces and woeful tales of a favorite fish that has met his maker. They don’t understand what happened to their friend and come to us for answers. The very first thing we ask is, have you tested your water for pH, ammonia or nitrites? A concentration (or any measure of) these two substances is dangerous to fish.