About the bloody fish?!

[TammyswansonTwo]

We bought our first house a couple of months ago. The garden has a pond in it, which I looked at and didn't see any fish, didn't think any more of it.

When we moved in, the owners left no information about anything (plus no keys for windows or internal doors etc, which pissed me off), took us a month to find the water mains tap which is hidden in the back of a random kitchen cupboard behind a board!). However, what they did leave was an almost empty bag of fish food in a kitchen cupboard. Hmm. Went out to the pond and added a bit of food thinking it was daft and four giant fish appeared - two massive goldfish and two koi. I looked up how the hell you look after fish, fed them as required but one died after a few weeks which really upset me.

Now the pump is clogged and I have literally no idea how to clean it out - I think it's attached to the bottom of the pond which is built into the decking, the cables must run underneath the decking, I can't even find the power for the bloody thing to turn it off.

AIBU to think you don't leave live animals for someone else to look after without at least telling them they exist, and without at least basic information on the set up to enable them to take care of them? I'm really panicking that these poor fish are going to die, and can't find anyone to take them as apparently combining fish from different ponds is dangerous.

Shit.

TBH, goldfish can live quite happily without much food for months. Big ones need food, but there may be enough mosquito larvae keeping them going. Your friend will have to quarantine them before just sticking them in with hers.

Idiot vendor phoned me 2 days before moving to tell me he was leaving his pond fish. Duh. I re-homed the fish and filled in the pond.

Re post, ring the agent, ask to drop off the post or get it collected. At the very least, they'll ring them and ask them to come and get post from the agent.

Ah you're doing a nice thing sorting this out. I bought a flat and the previous owners left the cat. Not even kidding! Bloody viscous thing! My parents ended up taking it on and it lived with them for years!

PS if you decide to keep the fish/pond, again, ask the agent to contact the vendor re where switches are/how to access the pump. It's probably clogged, my current pond needs the pump clearing every few weeks. Fish are dirty and need their water kept clean with a good filtration system.

We inherited 5 enormous boring koi in a very leaky concrete pond. We sold the fish for £90 and lined the pond which is now a wildlife pond with no fish.

My parents moved into a house with a ghost koi left behind. They did so much for that fish. A new pump, fancy food, special pond treatments, her on defences, bought it company. Then a snake got in the pond. Ate the smaller ones and injured the poor thing.
But it took us a week or two to realise it was there. I don't get how people can do that.

The good news is at this time of year pond fish feeding should be reduced ready for the winter, so a couple of times a week should be fine. If you've found someone rehome them great, if not I'd pop to the nearest garden centre with an aquatics section, they'll be more than happy to give advice, and may even send someone out to show you how to maintain the pump (I used to do this). There are ways of making ponds child safe if you do decide to keep them!

We moved house a few weeks ago too, it was left in a proper state, dirt everywhere and pervious owner left furniture and all sorts behind (broken glass in draws, used toilet brushes). There was a pond outside but the water was black so we didn't think anything could be living in there, a few days after we moved in we noticed a fish floating, (lots of leaves on the pond water and FiL told us that had probably killed it) was upset that he didn't even tell us there was a fish in there, although the way he left the house I wasn't surprised

Koi are pretty valuable. I imagine you’ll have no problem rehoming them.