nwaas.com

I woke up this morning to a sad discovery, all my goldfish were dead! I think it was lack of oxygen because the water is 87 and the hose that usally makes bubbles was knocked in the pond by something(hopefully my sisters cat not a racoon). Would be safe to add some tropical fish to it since it's summer?

I know a lot of people keep tropical fish in their outdoor water features. To me the biggest problem with that would be timing to bring them back in again. Also, you want to make sure that the water quality is okay since you had a major fish kill. Good luck!

As I was looking thru the pond I found 2 big chunks of my pumpkin plants that had fallen in the pond and broken off. They were decomposing so I think that that might of had something to do with it too. Upon taking the fish out I noticed 3 still had a little bit of life left in them so I put them in a 5 gallon bucket with cooler water and they recovered. I changed some of the pond water and I'm not going to put any tropical fish in it.

87 degree water is quite warm for tropicals, let alone goldfish. something you might consider is paradise fish. they are more tolerant of heat and cold than many tropicals plus they will consume more mosquito's than anything else you can put in there... they're also easy to house for the winter.. kyle

Mosquito fish do pretty well too but anything will need some aeration in our hotter times like now. I lose fish in my smaller non aerated tubs under 40 gallons in the heat about every year. I have some killifish in a pond without air and so far so good but it is 200 gallons and fairly deep.
Jack

that's what's nice about the paradise fish, they can breathe air!

I generally keep paradise outside in the summer but ran out of them last winter and never bought more. One of my all time favorite fish. Had them off and on for the past 40 years.

Jack