Hi Jason, Great questions. I believe that with a minimal fish load and lots of plants and water movement, clear water is certainly possible. Be prepared to deal with a spring algae bloom - easy to do with a pre filter of quilt batting or batting the water from your weir can flow thru. I change it as needed thru the algae bloom and then don't need it for the rest of the summer. You'll also need to have a plan for the goldfish offspring. With all that anacharis they will have lots of places to hide and goldfish reproduce at an amazing rate. (I had 3 goldies I thought were too young produce 28 babies in 3 months) The fry will need to be removed to prevent overloading your pond. I feed my fish sparingly, just when I want to see them. It helps keep the excess nutrients (uneaten food) down, and mine certainly have lots of other stuff to eat. My ponds are small (300 and 250 gallons) compared to yours. This is just my experience, I'm sure others will chime in to give you better answers! Happy ponding! S

Hello there trickle! Of course I am here. I am into native flora and fauna for the sole purpose of restoration and conservation but my bogs are just for me and are pure pleasure. They are my treat to myself. Perhaps not somebody else's vision of a garden but maybe Fred will send you a few photos of his bogs so you will know what I want mine to look like someday. Hi Fred, she has to go with natives as she's dealing with a vernal pond. She doesn't need to risk mitigation in the future and authorities are getting very itchie lately. That can bankrupt a person. She has another pond that she can be less cautious with. So, natives will prevail for the vernal pond but she can most assuredly have a free for all with the other pond. Let me tell you a secret... I bought two non native plants for one of my water gardens. Shhh, don't tell anyone. They aren't invasive though. Ohhhhh Freeeeedddddddddddd! My calopogan bloomed! I talk to it everyday and tell it what a good calopogan it was to bloom for Mommie! My friends think I am absolutely nuts as the first thing I do is walk everybody over to where it is blooming so they can oogle at my sole flowering calopogan. Friends smile and are most assuredly thinking I have lost it. Say, what about American Cranberry for her? Viburnum trilobum. I just bought a buttonbush at The Natural Garden last weekend. That was a nice suggestion. Such a neat flowering shrub. So lush and well... buttony for lack of a better word. Last but not least, I just sunk another 250 gallon preform in the ground in hopes some amphibians will use it next year. I placed it in shade so this one shouldn't have any problems with string algae.

In the Garden FAQ section, there are three tables of FAQ. I can't figure out how the logic of how Houzz places new FAQ into this, but it's annoying to find anything. Just before I started this post, Growing from Seed, Growing under Lights, and Growing Tomatoes were listed, in that order, on the far left table. When I pulled up the FAQ to clarify the order to type that out, I find that Growing under Lights is on the far left table and Growing Tomatoes and Growing from Seed (in that order) are on the far right table. Someone who has been directed to the FAQ section is going to be thrown by the lack of logical alphabetization, either down a column or across the rows, so please do one or the other as standard practice.

Calla lilies - they grew beautifully in my CA bog garden. You also might try some hydrangeas at the edges. Hydrangeas have a reputation of not wanting to be waterlogged, but they grew just fin in our CA bog. We also had the tall iris - probably almost native in your zone. If you want something big and dramatic, try something in the Gunnera Dinosaur, Plants Dinosaur, family! That should improve the view! lol