sweet thunder
Senior Member
Posts: 210
Joined: Thu Apr 02, 2009 1:43 pm
Location: Eureka, CA

More newbie/small pond questions

Like lilturtle, I am thinking of starting a container pond to test the waters, so to speak, and see if I'm ready to commit to an in-ground pond.

I have a half wine barrel I could use and my local garden center sells liners to make sure it's water tight. I would like to do a few water plants and a small handful of fish, and I would like it to be attractive to creatures that can help eat slugs and bugs in my garden. Is that a possibility with such a small pond? What would I need to place around/near it to attract the good guys? Would frogs and toads need to be introduced, or if I build it, will they come?

Any and all advice is welcome, especially since I am still trying to convince my husband that this is a good idea!

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Kisal
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Posts: 7646
Joined: Tue Jun 24, 2008 1:04 am
Location: Oregon

I've never had a barrel pond, so I really can't advise you very well. The frogs visit my ponds, along with a variety of other wildlife. My neighbor has a water garden in a half-barrel, and she purchased a frog for it. Her daughter heard mine and wanted one, too. :lol:

I have no idea how she keeps the frog from wandering away in search of a mate. I haven't been over to her place yet to look at her little water garden.

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applestar
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Posts: 30514
Joined: Thu May 01, 2008 7:21 pm
Location: Zone 6, NJ (3/M)4/E ~ 10/M(11/B)

Around here only non tropical frogs available for purchase are (as far as I know) bullfrog tadpoles at pond centers. I usually get ones with developed hind legs and front legs starting so They're sure to turn into frogs this season and have a better chance of survival than staying in my bog, paddy, or even the unstable experimental pond I had last year can offer.

My neighbor has a professionally installed pond and a little way off behind our property, there is also a natural "run" that has been redirected into an underground drainage and leads to a community pond. So hopefully that's where Mr. Hoppy went when he disappeared last fall.

We find toads living in the oddest places around here-- for a long time, there was one living in the motor propeller housing of the boat on the driveway, when we had one of those large fill up pools, they always moved into the folds in the pool cover. I found a tree frog in the corn leaf where it connects to the stalk just yesterday, and have seen them in gladiolus leaf joints when I used to grow them, oh, and in the Lacinato kale last summer. They do come around... I have no idea how or from where.



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