Tench like ponds (photo from Fishbase)
I noticed the question above in the blog stats: do tench eat dead algae?
The answer is probably a pretty simple no, not deliberately.
Tench are natural pond inhabitants – though like all but the very smallest fish they need a fair bit of space.
They can survive very low oxygen levels – with as little as 0.7 milligrammes of oxygen in a litre of water under the ice.
In my pond at present the there is about 8-10 milligrammes oxygen per litre of water.
Adult tench eat invertebrates: snails, shrimps, slaters, dragonfly larvae – anything living on the bottom they can get their teeth into.
Baby tench, the fry, eat tiny pond animals: protozoans, water fleas and rotifers.
Both young fish and adults do eat algae but this may be incidental to catching animals.
So if you want something to remove pond sludge, try the vacuum cleaner!
Tags: Pond fish
