Hey everyone, was wondering about thoughts or ideas. My (used) tank is falling into disrepair and I do not have the funds or $ to repair or replace. I was planning on selling it as a reptile tank eventually but it has to be sooner. Problem is what to do with my fish. We have a LARGE pond (1 acre+) in the backyard that I've thought about placing him in, only problem is the weather is getting colder, the pond never freezes or anything but it is def colder than the 80 degrees he's used to. I do have one person I know with a much larger tank than I that I can see if he wants. But if he doesn't want him I'm really considering the pond, it really large and he'd have plenty of bugs and baby fish to eat (other fish in the pond are brim, catfish, and bass) Oliver is about 8 inches long. Thanks for any ideas or opinions/stories of pond oscars.

Are you in Australia? Oscars have somehow got into the waterways in Florida and I know for sure that it does sometimes get quite cold there, in fact it has actually snowed on occasions. I don't know if we have any members from Florida, maybe they could tell you how cold the water gets at certain times of the year. If you were to introduce the Oscar into a pond when the water is at its warmest then it probably would get used to the water as it cooled down, as long as it doesn't drop too low. Oscars do you come from the tropics so you really wouldn't want them living in anything less than 21°C. I am also assuming it is your pond?

We're in Northwest Florida, and the property is ours and will stay as such. It does get down into the 20's (F) in the winter but we haven't had snow here since the 1980's. I know it would be better to put him in the summer and let the water gradually cool but I really need to do something now. I've put so much time and money into Oliver I hate to lose him, I just don't know what to do. I will NOT take him to the pet store, I've seen too many bad things from there. I just called a friend who has a 100+ tank with not much in it to see if he wants to take him, waiting to hear back. I'll go take the temp of the pond water now.

I would suggest slowly bringing the temperature of your tank water down over a couple of days to try and match the temperature of the water outside. I suppose it depends on how warm it is inside your house, without heating the tank, you should be able to drop the temperature of the water down considerably. And then if there is still a difference, put the fish in a bag and rest it in the pond water for about an hour so the water it is in slowly matches the pond water.

When you said it gets down to the 20s in Fahrenheit, did you actually mean Celsius? 20°F is enough to freeze over a pond which will probably kill an Oscar.

I was just going to say I would try lowering the tank temp slowly and see how he reacts! We keep the house around 70F.

We'll get a hard freeze at night but it always warms back up during the day and the pond has never frozen, neither has the much smaller pond. I just measured the temps, in his tank currently it is 80F or ~26 C, the pond currently is 60F or 15C. It is spring fed and maybe that helps keep the temp kind of constant? I don't know, I would love to see him do well and get HUGE in the pond but I don't want to hurt him. Still waiting to hear back from the friend with the larger tank...

I certainly would like to commit myself and say your fish would be perfectly okay in your pond. I know the Oscars are found living wild in Florida but these have probably been there so long they have acclimatised themselves to the colder conditions, taking a fish that is used to tropical temperatures and putting it in cold water may put it at risk from disease. I really don't know if it would be okay.

sell some of your land and buy a new tank!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!lol

lowest lethal temperature for an o is 13,9oC.
So if your water is ever gonna get below 14oC, your fish will die.

well i know you can buy heaters for ponds for the colder days here in colorado but i would be more worried about flooding out your pond and him escaping into the eco system the most i know they have an issue with the chichlids in some of the canals but if you are truely worried i would say give him to a friend where you know there wont be an issue cause im facing the same delima my 90 gal has seen its last days and its either reseal the tank or sell my entire setup my buddy will take him and the tank but the thing is its a hard decision.

rumncoke0482 wrote:


Oscars have already got into the waterways around Florida.

lol i said chichlid i was not sure if they have or not didnt want to put out false info lol lucky for me they are in the same family lol

www.jessstryker.com/national-parks/everglades/fish-oscar.html

www.flmnh.ufl.edu/fish/gallery/Descript/oscar/oscar.html

Love to do some fishing there!
I'm sure I want to take home all the O's I catch, dunno if that's smart.