Using low voltage halogen lighting and dome lights in your pond

I have a variety of lights in my pond, some halogen spots, some lower wattage coloured dome lamps. The dome lamps shine upwards, which silhouettes any water surface plants, the halogens shine across the pond underwater.

I also have a tripod stand which rests on the bottom of the pond. The 3 lamps on it are held about 6 inches below the surface and these point DOWNWARDS, angled slightward outward. These are NOT halogen, so the heat generated is gentle.


Not only does this light up the bottom of the pond, but in the cold weather my koi constantly fin themselves so they hover directly underneath the beam of light. They are sun-tanning themselves!! Well, keeping warm anyway.

Amusingly the light gets reflected off their big fins as they fan them, and its almost like you've got a pulsing police car beacon in your pond.

So the point is that the fish enjoy lighting as much as you will.

Generally these are all white lights. However one of the domes is red and the smaller goldfish and shebunkins love this, and sometimes I've seen 3 at one go trying to stay on top of it. This lamp doesn't generate any more heat than the white or green dome lamps, so I think its something to do with the colour!?

Anybody else experienced this?

The problems with lights:

• Make sure you fix them well. The fish will nudge them and then they end up floating on the surface.
  
• White lights will soon get coated with a layer of algae, so you should place these where you can get at them easily to clean them off. I am certain my fish look forward to me cleaning off the algae so they can get back to their tanning again !

To learn more, see my Low Voltage Pond Lights page.

Cheers
Jim