The Fishless Pond

I've written a few posts about out little back yard pond, like this one and this one.  It's been a labor of love for Handy Man.  It turned out beautiful.  In fact I was planning to take Fall pond pictures this weekend to share with all of you.

Last summer when the pond first went in, before the waterfall or the filtration system, we dumped in some feeder goldfish.  They all lived through the winter and we were thinking of getting some more expensive fish, like Koi.  Then this guy showed up and we decided to wait on getting Koi.

We did get some really pretty fan tailed goldfish and they had grown and thrived in the pond along with the older fish.  The dark one on the left side of the picture had started turning orange on his underside and had grown bigger than any of the other fish.  My friend Chrissy named him Abraham.

When we had friends over they loved to feed the fish.  My friend Chrissy, from Boston named a few of them.

The only major challenge we've had all summer is raccoons draining the bog, hence draining the pond of all but about 8 inches of water.  While this has been a nuisance, it hasn't been horribly damaging.  The fish and plants have lived through it all.  Handy Man built the pond deep enough and straight enough on the sides to make it very difficult, if not impossible, for raccoons to get in and grab fish... Or so we thought. 

As a precaution with winter coming and the raccoons being hungrier Handy Man worked on shoring up the bog over the weekend.  He used a wood board and plexi-glass to make the sides stronger, hopefully preventing the raccoons from knocking then in. 

Unfortunately it didn't work and apparently the raccoons were hungry enough or finally smart enough to figure out how to get to the fish.  Although how they did it I really can't tell.  The following pictures are icky, so you might not want to look.

 

I'm not sure what our next move will be.  I got this text from Handy Man this morning (this is how I found out about the fish)... War is declared against the raccoons.  They ate all the fish.  He should have told me they only ate the heads so I wouldn't have been so shocked when I finally looked.

Do you have any raccoon stories or advice about how to get rid of them?!

Comments

[The Incredible Woody]

Damn raccoons!

[Mental P Mama]

&*&^%&*^%&* raccoons. GAH

[asthmagirl]

My dad has declared war upon the raccoons. *graphic story follows.

He puts out raccoon cage traps because one of his neighbors on the island enjoys the occasional raccoon. (don't ask)
The first raccoon dad caught in the cage was rather "zesty". My dad was wondering how to pick the cage up because the critter was going nuts rocking the cage back and forth and growling. Dad had the cage set up on the curved cement bridge over his coy pond. The raccoon finally rocked the cage so much growling at dad that the cage fell in the pond. By the time dad went in the house and got his pond boots on... well... unfortunately, the raccoon did not survive the dunking. And the neighbor wouldn't take it because it was already demised.
The trials of living in the boonies....

[Chrissy]

I am heart broken, I loved those fish..to see them headless is horrible.

[Jenn @ Juggling Life]

Around here it is not raccoons, but skunks.

I hope your hubby wins.

[Rachel]

Oh I love those pictures! They make my rather scatterbrained head feel much calmer. :)