What a strange outcome, but great news

Hi,

I have a pond that my father built for me 2 years ago and I stocked it with some koi and goldfish. Over the 2 years some died, but the rest thrived and grew to a decent size which I was really pleased with. Last Tuesday of last week my care worker said in the morning the fish aren't eating and I thought they were just hiding behind a flap underneath the waterfall, which they usually do. That afternoon I saw a few swimming around. On Wednesday we couldn't see any, so my carer prodded at the flap and we think we saw 2 or 3 fish came out. By Thursday we couldn't see any, but 1 was lying on the ground dead. We do have a heron in our area, but I couldn't imagine the heron could get the fish with the way I have the pond as I've got plant pots lining the edge of the pond. However, I did a search on the internet to see how to prevent herons getting the fish. I was reading a lot of people saying the nets, plastic herons, etc. didn't work. But I saw 1 post saying that they installed an electric fence around their pond, which has worked for them and other people said the same. So I ordered 1 from Swells.

On the Friday my father lifted the flap and put his hand right accross, prodded around other areas, but not fish were to be seen. The electric fence arrived, so dad set it up on the Saturday and still no fish.

On Sunday I placed an order with a supplier I've used before for koi & goldfish. They arrived today as planned and once I got them acclimetised to the water, i released them. 5 minutes later my carers said "hang on, did you get any large fish/" I said "only the goldfish". As we looked, we were seeing large koi appearing and we started to recconnise the fish that were missing. We think we can see 9 or 10 of my old koi and I did have about 16 left before last week.

We have no idea where they were hiding at all, but they must have been scared stiff.

Have anyone else experienced this, as I've never heard of it?

Cal

 

After a good few years my fish, (goldfish) have suddenly become very shy.

It's due to a heron, and I'm pretty sure you have the same problem.
The fish just hide up under anything they can find.
I've noticed a couple of mine have some quite large scars, presumably from near misses with the heron.
I've now put pots all around my pond as I dont like nets, the fish are slowly becoming their usual selves but it's taking time.