Pieces of Eight – Eight Goldfish for My Pond

My husband and kids went to get some goldfish for the pond yesterday. My two youngest love to go get fish. They have been waiting with excitement since we cleaned the pond out.

My husband took them to PetsMart to get the goldfish. We just buy the cheap kind, either the ¢12 (1″) or ¢25 (1 1/2″) goldfish that they normally sell for food or bait. My husband opted for the ¢25 fish this time and they brought home eight.

We just buy the cheap ones because:

• There are raccoons in the neighborhood who sometimes eat our fish and I won’t pay for a gourmet raccoon dinner
• They grow pretty fast. In a month or so, they will be as big as 3″ or 4″.
• You can still find some pretty colored goldfish in the cheapies

In the past, we would have released last year’s surviving fish back into the pond as well. My husband keeps them in a fish tank in the basement over the winter when we don’t kill them.

Unfortunately, we accidentally killed the goldfish late in the season last year. Note to self: Do not feed goldfish corn muffin crumbs. *blush*

The goldfish are now in the pond swimming happily. Now, if I could just find a good source of tadpoles, I would be a very happy pond owner.