{"id":987,"date":"2018-08-20T08:31:26","date_gmt":"2018-08-20T12:31:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/site.extension.uga.edu\/water\/?p=987"},"modified":"2018-08-21T09:50:45","modified_gmt":"2018-08-21T13:50:45","slug":"does-goldie-need-a-new-home-use-something-other-than-a-stormwater-pond","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/site.extension.uga.edu\/water\/2018\/08\/does-goldie-need-a-new-home-use-something-other-than-a-stormwater-pond\/","title":{"rendered":"Does Goldie need a new home? —- Use something other than a Stormwater pond."},"content":{"rendered":"

Do you have a goldfish that has outgrown it’s current residence?\u00a0 Well if you do and it has, find a larger residence in your home, but do not take Goldie out to the local stormwater pond.\u00a0 Miriam King with the Orillia newspaper in Ontario, Canada printed a story the other day that describes how stormwater ponds are becoming the new homes of many goldfish.\u00a0 The stormwater pond is designed to store water from storms, settle sediment, and remove pollutants, but is not a home for goldfish.\u00a0 The story describes how municipalities are having to deal with the stormwater pond and the presence of goldfish.\u00a0 I have copied the story below, but the\u00a0story can be found on the Orilliamatters.com website under the story titled ‘Thousands’ of goldfish live in area stormwater ponds and that’s a problem<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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Goldfish can grow up to 40 centimetres long and appear to be thriving in these man-made structures. Officials aren’t yet sure what they’re going to do about it<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
2 days ago\u00a0by:\u00a0Miriam King<\/span><\/div>\n
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    A stormwater pond off Langford Boulevard in Bradford West Gwillimbury. There are invasive goldfish in some of the town’s stormwater ponds, according to Town of BWG staff. Jenni Dunning\/BradfordToday<\/span><\/div>\n

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    Look along the edge of a stormwater pond and you are likely to\u00a0see\u00a0a glimmer of gold\u00a0among the weeds and roots.<\/p>\n

    A school of Carassius auratus \u2013 common goldfish.<\/p>\n

    Goldfish are not native to Ontario. They are \u2018pets\u2019 released to the wild by owners who think it\u2019s the nice thing to do, rather than return the fish to a pet store, give them away, or even dispose of Goldie the goldfish.<\/p>\n

    Unfortunately, goldfish are members of the carp family, native to east Asia \u2013 and they are invasive. Released to the wild, they can grow up to 40 centimetres\u00a0in length. In fact, there is a commercial fishery for \u201cgolden carp\u201d in Lake Erie.<\/p>\n

    There are also concerns that, as bottom-feeders and big producers of waste, they can have a big impact on water quality.<\/p>\n

    Just ask David Lembcke, Manager of Environmental Science and Monitoring with the Lake Simcoe Region Conservation Authority (LSRCA). He discovered the goldfish problem while looking into the effectiveness of existing stormwater ponds in managing pollutants.<\/p>\n

    Stormwater ponds are not natural features. They are specifically constructed to provide flood control and to trap pollutants and nutrients \u2013 from heavy metals and pesticides to phosphorus – that could negatively impact downstream watercourses.<\/p>\n

    \u201cThey\u2019re doing some things well, others not well,\u201d Lembcke said, noting that over the past few years, \u201cwe\u2019ve had really strange instances of some ponds that were not clearing up.\u201d<\/p>\n

    Particles and pollutants are supposed to settle out in stormwater ponds, allowing the water to clear before it leaves the facility. In the puzzling ponds, the turbidity remained high. \u201cWe just couldn\u2019t figure out why,\u201d said Lembcke.<\/p>\n

    The LSRCA looked at the size of the pond, the nature of the catchment area, whether there were algal or diatom blooms \u2013 \u201cNothing was adding up.\u201d<\/p>\n

    Nothing, until one day someone observed a school of goldfish in one of the ponds\u00a0\u201cand the lightbulb went off.\u201d<\/p>\n

    Goldfish, as bottom feeders, keep the sediments stirred up, preventing them from settling out. That was something that Lembcke and his team understood well, but they questioned whether there could possibly be enough goldfish to have an impact, and wondered how the fish could survive in what was essentially a pollution control facility, with high salinity, low oxygen levels and high levels of pollutants.<\/p>\n

    They found that there are \u201cvery, very large populations of these fish,\u201d he said, even though the turbidity makes it difficult to estimate exact numbers.<\/p>\n

    Not only are goldfish surviving the harsh conditions, they are thriving, and reproducing. \u201cSome of these ponds have thousands of goldfish,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

    The finding poses several problems. Goldfish are invasive, and although the ponds seem to be containing the populations, \u201cwe certainly don\u2019t want them to get out into the receiving water bodies.\u201d<\/p>\n

    Then there\u2019s the turbidity issue. Not only are the solids and pollutants not settling out in the \u201cgoldfish ponds,\u201d\u00a0there is the threat that the materials will be washed into downstream water bodies, \u201cdefinitely short-circuiting the function of the ponds.\u201d<\/p>\n

    For the past two years, Lembcke and his team have been studying the ponds\u00a0and have found a co-relation between murky water and goldfish.<\/p>\n

    \u201cWe\u2019ve sort of identified that turbid ponds are related to goldfish,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s really difficult to go out there and confirm how common this is.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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    The problem seems to be more common in residential ponds than in industrial or commercial areas. \u201cIn one pond, we even found a huge Koi,\u201d he said, which supports the idea that people are releasing pet fish into the wild\u00a0\u2013 despite signs that warn\u00a0people not to dump aquarium species.<\/p>\n

    It seems to be an issue right across Ontario. \u201cWe\u2019ve been chatting with a number of municipalities. Now lightbulbs are going off,\u201d said Lembcke.<\/p>\n

    Bradford West Gwillimbury is one of those municipalities.<\/p>\n

    \u201cWe can suspect that our stormwater ponds have goldfish in them,\u201d noted Terry Foran, Director of Community Services. \u201cWe performed a capital program last year to clean one of the storm ponds as a maintenance activity, and we did find goldfish in that pond, along with other native species typical to our geographic area.\u201d<\/p>\n

    As for the impact of the fish, the town is waiting for the LSRCA\u2019s report, said Foran.<\/p>\n

    \u201cOnce the LSRCA has concluded their study and made possible recommendations on how to better control the impacts, we will consider those and hopefully implement them at a local level.\u201d<\/p>\n

    What is next? \u201cThat\u2019s a great question,\u201d said Lembcke. \u201cThese fish, once they\u2019re in there, are very, very tough to get rid of\u2026. Once they are out there, your strategies very quickly have to change.\u201d<\/p>\n

    In one conservation authority jurisdiction, it took three years of electrofishing to rid a stormwater pond of goldfish.<\/p>\n

    Right now, the idea is to try to clear out the goldfish when the affected ponds come up for maintenance, while taking steps to ensure the invasive fish aren\u2019t flushed into the receiving waterbodies. \u201cIt\u2019s very challenging,\u201d Lembcke said. \u201cThey\u2019re tough\u2026 We have to throw something pretty tough at them to get rid of them.\u201d<\/p>\n

    Goldfish aren\u2019t the only problem in some stormwater ponds. The amount of garbage either thrown or blown into the ponds is \u201cshocking,\u201d Lembcke said. \u201cWe keep getting surprised.\u201d<\/p>\n

    As for goldfish, he said. \u201cWe\u2019re used to dealing with the chemical side. It\u2019s been a bit of a curveball for us.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Goldfish and stormwater ponds do not go together.\u00a0 Why you ask.\u00a0 Read the full story for more information.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":145,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-987","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-stormwater"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/site.extension.uga.edu\/water\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/987","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/site.extension.uga.edu\/water\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/site.extension.uga.edu\/water\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/site.extension.uga.edu\/water\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/145"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/site.extension.uga.edu\/water\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=987"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/site.extension.uga.edu\/water\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/987\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":990,"href":"https:\/\/site.extension.uga.edu\/water\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/987\/revisions\/990"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/site.extension.uga.edu\/water\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=987"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/site.extension.uga.edu\/water\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=987"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/site.extension.uga.edu\/water\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=987"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}