Jim Nelson

During the past 35 years I have traveled the world as a member of the scientific fishery community. My education and background training is in pathogenic microbiology and biochemistry where I developed fish vaccines for the aquaculture industry. During that time I gained an appreciation for how damaged the environment became around activities including fish culture and human habitation and farming practices. The pond standard now is a hole in the ground with water in it. The best way to treat disease is to improve the environment and the best way to do this is using natural components.

Pond Leaves

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Dearest Gluggums, I am often asked if they should leave a tree hanging over the pond. They always say it is filling the pond with leaves. I laugh. Our entire soil agriculture has come from these leaves. As rivers wind their way through valleys, they take their canopy with them. This is typically cottonwoods, alder … Read more

Fall Pond

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Dear Gluggums, Ron sent this photo of his pond. Three years ago he called the PonDoc to fix his cattail weed infested algae pit and this is what we did. Actually Ron and his boys with his mate Pete hauled buckets of gravel to form the pond engines and planted several thousand sedge. Yesterday he … Read more

Pond Climate

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Dearest Froggie, As a professional PonDoc, I look at the dialogue concerning man-made climate change with some amusement. It has government and huge environmental movements making a lot of noise and doing nothing. I know my soap box is about as useful. The reason is basically human. When a pond is owned by more than … Read more

Summer Pond

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Glug, It is so wonderful to have another beautiful summer. My pond owners are complaining. In the middle of the summer, a pond can be as good as it gets or as bad. And there is nothing a PonDoc can do now. The reason is the metabolism of the pond is at full tilt. Everything … Read more

Living Pond

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Gluggers, You being a pond froggie know that the entire pond is alive. However, when people dig ponds they do not leave space (habitat) for the pond life. A pond is alive and has thousands of species feeding in it. The microbial life of a pond is the most important. Its habitat is simple being … Read more

Pond Trees

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Dear Frog, I am back on the road this season. Wonderful!!  I am visiting hamlets of heaven: back yard ponds. One of the major problems of most man-made ponds is a lack of a canopy. All natural waterways and ponds have trees and shrubs next to their shores. More specifically, they have hydrophilic plants that … Read more

Pond Water Management

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Dearest Gluggums, “Help PonDoc I have a leak!” I ask, how big of leak? “Oh, I know it is going down.” You don’t. You must calculate and find out. It is relatively simple. All bodies of water evaporate into the atmosphere at about 660 gallons (2,500 liters) of water per day per quarter acre and … Read more

Pond Nutrition

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Dear Frog, Because people eat gluttonously they think that everything else does too. Most of the animals and plants in our environment hibernate a good portion of the year dormant and when active require only a meal or two. Your fish do not need feed nor do your plants need fertilizer. Put your pond on … Read more

Pond Economics

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Gluggie, “Help PonDoc, my pond has weeds and I cannot afford to fix it!” Ha! Mother Nature provides all. Money is the least of your problems. Weeds come from nutrients. As you know, they flow down-hill. Often yards are constructed around ponds and fertilized. This fertilizer flows into the pond and the weeds are fed … Read more

Pond Components

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Dear Glug, You cannot have fish unless you make a fishery. To have fish, you need all of the pond components. This is called an eco-system and is composed of plants and animals. The plants are the “primary producers” and are in balance with animals, the “primary decomposers”. This is a biological system; and for … Read more