Keeping Raccoons out of the pond...

After 15 years of owning a large 3-tiered Koi pond w/waterfalls, and fish in all 3 levels.....its an been an on-going battle for the last 7 years, to keep the predators away. I've fended off various breeds of hawks, blue & white cranes and other water birds. I tried the net-over-the-pond. Then it was difficult to clean the pond....which is done by a service every week. And they didn't like the time, the net added to their work. So I removed the netting and then I tried solar activated movement owls........it worked for about 3 months.....then the cranes were back. And in one afternoon they would wipe out almost all my fish. I had lots of palm tree's around the pond...and decided to build an aviary that we could walk into. I strung 100lb fishing line beteen the trees at about 6.5ft above the ground level. And then covered them with the fruit tree netting. It hangs all the way to the ground....And! It has worked great keeping the birds out.

But now........we have RACOONS!! And they got my 5 biggest fish in the lower pond 3 nights ago. And tore up the lower pond lily pads pretty bad. Looked like a bomb went off in the pond. The next night I put out a metal trap, and somehow they got the bait in it, and didn't set it off. We saw 3 of them the next night. So I reset it last night, and caught the neighborhood feral cat. Which I like....as he's a good "mouser". We live in the desert....and have roadrunners. I've seen them catch/stab a mouse and eat it. So we feed them.....and like'em in the neighbor hood. I'm going to reset the trap tonight, and hope that the cat learned its lesson....and stays away. The picture is from years ago....and now we have 3/4's of the water covered with lily pads. So lots of cover for the fish. And we have cinder blocks for them to hide in too.