Goldfish Gone

[rosewall1]

In my pond over the last five years in Torba we have had two goldfish who have grown to a good size. They have over wintered as usual with no problems, living between 1 and 2 ft deep. One day I noticed that one had gone missing, no sign of it what so ever, no evidence. Now a few weeks later the other one has gone missing. Now I know about herons in the UK but what could have gone so deep and had the fish here. Our garden is completely enclosed and to be honest I cannot see that a human is involved because nobody knows we have fish. So has anyone any ideas, birds, animal or ?????

 

[Martyn]

Maybe a cat when they surface?

 

[bobthenob]

Cats are well known to wait for hours during the night,until a fish touches the surface.With one swoop of the paw,can bring a large fish flapping on the ground.
Grass snakes are great swimmers for catching their prey.
And also humans are the most ferocious predators that has ever walked on the earth.lf a large colorful goldfish is their for the picking for a hungry humanoid to take he would and later find it on his plate with chips and a slice of soft white crusty bread tarnished with flavourings of herbs..mmmm
During the evening the atmosphere changes,where the oxygen has diminished a little,so the fish come's up to the surface to suck for air.lf they do not get the sufficient amount of oxygen they need,they will float on the surface,until a birdlike predator grabs it from the surface.

My bet goes on the humanoid taking it for his evening fish and chip supper

 

[kale]

don,t know if big gold fish do the same as small one,s
A couple of weeks ago for some reason i looked at the gold fish ( IN DOOR ONES) and to my horror there was only one ,so i thought the other one had may be eaten it so i sat down thinking no can,t have . then went for another look , then i said to my husband don,t move i bet it,s on the floor both on our hands and knees and YES there it was gulping about must have only just jumped don,t know how long they can suvive out of water . put it back in sunk to the bottom, then the other one started nudgeing it, and hey what do you think YES it,s ok good luck kale

 

[rosewall1]

I am 99% certain it is not cats as there is no sign of the fish, no human would get into the garden with our dog roaming around. I am pretty certain it can only be something that has eaten it and not played with it. The only snakes I have seen in the garden are very thin long black ones.

 

[bobthenob]

I am 99% certain it is not cats as there is no sign of the fish, no human would get into the garden with our dog roaming around. I am pretty certain it can only be something that has eaten it and not played with it. The only snakes I have seen in the garden are very thin long black ones.

Ok!,there could be another logical explanation here.l had a fish pond back in England,stocked up with large goldfish,comets,tench and shubunkins.l fed the pond with the right amount of oxygen by using a filtering system with a water pump.This allowed the right conditions for the aquatic life to thrive.
When my water pump packed up during the summer.The fish were sucking the surface for oxygen and started to jump out of the pond in a panic state.l noticed a few went missing this way.
l think this is what is happening with your fish.One jumped out and landed on the ground,vulnerable to the predators waiting.

 

[Harem]

and the second one missed the first one so much that he jumped out too, to find out where the other one had gone!!!

 

[stevecarol]

Hi Rosewall
Its almost certainly going to be a bird or cat that has taking your fish,
I keep koi and have had herons attempting to take fish that are approaching 12-15 inches in length, also have much larger fish of 18 inch plus that have been beaked, now these fish are living in 5 feet of water with straight sided pond, now have a pergola over the pond and not getting any problem, and the dogs keep the cats at bay.:fish2:

 

[immac]

Kingfishers.
Ian

 

[Higgy]

Our local small Garden Centre (UK) lost about 21 Koi Carp in a week to the dreaded and
protected Herons. Others had stab wounds on their backs. The pond had deep areas
to about 3 ft, they seem to appear and attack at first light.

 

[stevecarol]

My neighbough first told me that there was a heron on the side of my pond, and i took no notice, until first thing one morning i saw the beast, theye can take some very large fish and cause untold damage to fish, a real pain in the a##e. and i live in a built up area, not the sticks.

 

[Yildez Datca]

Many years ago I had a large cat called Cyril who regularly brought home presents for me. Usually it was a dead mouse or shrew, once it was a budgie and for a period of about 3 weeks it was a series of goldfish - still breathing!

I was able to rescue most of them (or perhaps it was the same one!!) and return them to our milkman - he lived just up the road and had a large fish pond. He covered it with netting to keep Cyril out - Cyril soon bit large holes in it; he tried chicken wire but the little devil still managed to hook the fish through it. In the end he used industrial grade wire mesh and Cyril gave up.

He then started to catch rabbits - but that's another story!

 

[KKOB]

I'd put money on it being a Heron.

 

[martin m]

lf a large colorful goldfish is their for the picking for a hungry humanoid to take he would and later find it on his plate with chips and a slice of soft white crusty bread tarnished with flavourings of herbs..mmmm

Not quite what rosewall wanted to read, but as usual bob lovely made me lol.
martin

 

[Peregrine]

Kingfishers.
Ian

? theyre rather small to be taking Koi. heron or stork the most likely culprits

 

[Kirpi]

I have no experience in Turkey, but my experience in the UK is the same as BobtheNob's. At some point in my pond fish's life some decided to jump out of the pond.

I found some, Others had disappeared. I don't know whether it was a lack of oxygen (I kept a fountain going), or overstocking (It was a small pool and these were very mature fish).

I put it down to experience and gave the remaining mature fish a few smaller fish to play with.