Pet Pike [or any other coarse fish for that matter].

This forum is for discussing pike.
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CraigM
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Pet Pike [or any other coarse fish for that matter].

Post by CraigM »

Does any other forum member keep a "pet" fish?

In my case it's a pet pike - or 7" pikelet to be more precise.

Ok, I'll concede straight away that a pike isn't really suited to a smallish glass fibre moulded garden pond measuring approx. 6' by 3' by 3' deep. The pond & a smaller one went in a year & a half ago & are full of weed & wildlife in the form of frogs, toads, newts ,bugs etc from the local village pond.

That pond has a decent head of coarse fish, especially carp, but is also full of small pike. "My" pikelet was netted during a pond work party in March & was about to be summarily despatched [which I don't really agree with but have to agree that their numbers are an issue] but was saved by me & a bucket of water. Hence it's addition to the larger of my two garden ponds.

For two months I didn't see any sign of it & thought it had either got stuck in the weed & died or been taken by a bird [we get crows in a neighbouring tree]. However a bit of weed clearance in late June & there it was - a little dark torpedo always facing the surrounding weed & therefore it's next meal.

No interest at all in bits of sardine at this point, but a worm wriggling in the water is a different matter.

Even if the worm is out of sight the pike detects the movement in a second; manoeuvres itself to face it & then zaps the worm from @ 6" away. Early morning & late evening are "dinner time". In the middle of the day it's nowhere to be seen.

Not surprisingly the frogs etc. have opted for the other pond!

I have to say that I [if not the worms] thoroughly enjoy feeding time [a bit like Blofeld & the piranha pool in "You Only Live Twice"] & if he/she gets bigger .............I'll have to dig another, bigger pond!

Again, I accept that such a potentially big fish doesn't belong in such a small environment but in the circumstances it's had the best of a bad lot & it's fascinating to observe it's behaviour. The bigger [much bigger] pond is a real option.

Paul D

Re: Pet Pike [or any other coarse fish for that matter].

Post by Paul D »

That's wonderful Craig, my son is an avid fishkeeper,we have 4 tropical tanks in the lounge,fascinating to watch.

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Santiago
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Re: Pet Pike [or any other coarse fish for that matter].

Post by Santiago »

I have several bullhead and minnows in an aquarium and feed them live small animals from the river which I collect by washing river plants and sieving the debris. My aquarium is based on river water and living on the river means it's easy to maintain. I've now brown hydra growing on the glass and they look like little jelly fish! Watching the fish is better than the TV.
"....he felt the gentle touch on the line and he was happy"

Hemingway

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Harry H
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Re: Pet Pike [or any other coarse fish for that matter].

Post by Harry H »

I caught a 2lb common from our local river in 1980 which at the time was a monster.My normal catch being Gudgeon,Perch and the occasional roach and as we had just built a garden pond of about 15ft x 9ft and a depth of 4ft it seem the right place for my biggest catch.Now 33years later its still swimming around the same pond and looks to be around the 8lb mark and has quite a few offspring with him/her. :Hat:
There are three things that improve with age: wine, friendship and water sense, and there's no short cut.
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Vole
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Re: Pet Pike [or any other coarse fish for that matter].

Post by Vole »

I had a chublet for a while, from whom I learnt how the chub "melt" is done - he was perfectly happy swimming backwards, and used to practice quite a bit. Not in the full-bore "pushmi-pullyu" sense that an eel can manage, but enough to drift out of sight with no eye-catching movements of the body.
He (full name at time of release: "Kevin the Chevin, the rub-a-dub chub" - comes of living in a household with a surfeit of cats...) was released back into the Gade, and was last seen trying to explain fish-tanks in general and televisions in particular, by semaphore with his pectoral fins, to his shoal-mates who were now twice his length...
Also had a crayfish for a while, but he spooked Mrs Vole by rearranging his furniture - half a flower-pot - with much scraping of gravel and clanking of pottery on glass, at two in the morning, and went back whence he came.
"Write drunk, edit sober" - Hemingway.
Hemingway didn't have to worry about accidentally hitting "submit" before he edited.

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Marc
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Re: Pet Pike [or any other coarse fish for that matter].

Post by Marc »

We have a tench called Hector and several gudgeon in our pond. We went to an aquatics shop with the intention of buying the obligatory goldfish and I clocked these. Much more interesting. Mind, Hector dwells in the depths of the pond and is only rarely seen.
Marc. (Prince of Durham)

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Julian
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Re: Pet Pike [or any other coarse fish for that matter].

Post by Julian »

I have a garden pond that I try to make as natural as possible. It is 12ft by 8ft - but only 2ft 3ins deep in the central area.
It has a liner but other than that no filters or normal pumps etc - so it looks like a mini-natural pool - fairly clear water at this time of year but very dark as silt builds up on the bottom.
One big lily bed which grows so prolifically that I have to pull out numerous pads and stems every week. There is also a section of yellow iris in one corner and I put oxygenating weed in each year.
I have 'pet' fish in the pond - one golden tench, two (or possibly three) green tench, five rudd and two (or possibly three ) common carp.
It has plenty of natural food and although the fish will eat some floating pellets in the hot weather I don't need to feed them most of the year.
Amazingly most fish have survived the big freezes we have each winter and I have solved the problem of oxygen crashes by having a simple solar powered oxygen pump which has two tubes going into the pond that bubble oxygen through from soon after dawn to dusk. The solar panels ( I have a spare one as well) have 4AA batteries on them but I swop them over almost daily during this very warm summer to ensure there are fully charged batteries that will therefore come on each morning, when the oxygen level is lowest.

The reason I am not quite sure about the number of fish is that they rarely show themselves, even though my bedroom overlooks the pond (with the exception of the golden tench, and the five little rudd, which were spawned in the pond). On a very hot July evening this year I shone a weak torch beam into the water after dark and all ( I think it was all) the fish were active in the open areas - feeding or spawning activity. In the daytime they keep hidden under the lily pads, and the winter the water is cloudy
There is no peace on earth like the peace of fishing in the early mornings

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Shaun Harrison
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Re: Pet Pike [or any other coarse fish for that matter].

Post by Shaun Harrison »

Can't be sure what I have in my pool as nature provided gudgeon and roach that I never stocked. I have also spotted Dace but pretty certain they came as spawn amongst some plants from a Cambridgeshire pit. My Pool is a natural pool with no artificial liner so can become quite coloured when the carp are foraging the bloodworm beds in the silt thus never being 100% sure what is in there. The Gudgeon shoal and roach turned up or should I say appeared for the first time as barely year old fish yet it had been several years since I had last introduced plants as it is very much self sufficient so my other species had to have come via the birds I guess.

I started with a rather boring and conventional garden.

Image

Then brought some land next door and decided to dig a pool

Image

I didn't like the manicured look so decided to create a nature reserve in the garden

Image

I get lots of wildlife call in to see me now and my 'pet fish' have now been joined by immigrants that weren't invited but are welcome. It is nice to see a surprise swimming by in your garden.
Problem I have now the pool is established how I want it but I can't take it anywhere with be and I'm also too impatient to start another from scratch. So it looks like I will be here at Claymire for a few more years yet.

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Dave Burr
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Re: Pet Pike [or any other coarse fish for that matter].

Post by Dave Burr »

I've always wanted a long tank down the side of one room containing a pike and a shoal of minnow - who'd need a telly?

I have kept gudgeon, skimmer bream, roach, chub, carp, tench and even some barbel provided by Calverton for some experiments. Watching fish in a tank can be completely absorbing, the time I spent with my barbel was fascinating, I made certain they didn't become 'tame' as most fish quickly do and they remained corpuscular and would search every square inch of the tank for food including the surface. Unfortunately Mrs Burr had her way with the garden pond and it contains mainly Koi but the common carp has doubled in size this summer and must be about 2lbs now.

Grubenreiner

Re: Pet Pike [or any other coarse fish for that matter].

Post by Grubenreiner »

I had some small tench for a season in a tank in my living room. Was very interesting watching them.
They were only about fingersize but managed to feed on full grown (nearly their size) lobworms. They took one end of the worm in their mouth and bit of a piece at a time shoving it in slowly but steadily.

Sadly the tank broke due to an accident and i had to release them into the wild.

Since then my tench catches have rapidly declined :Confused: , i guess they spread the word about me being a kidnapper not worthy of catching the red eyed beautys :Wink:

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