Something hard I had to do...

[Riso-chan]

You're right about it being illegal, but I'm not the type to just let the suffering of an animal continue due to another's ignorance.

UDATE:

I told you there were three left in there, well now there's two. Our dog jumped in and must've grabbed the albino goldfish because I found him/her floating and had to fish him out. I buried it in the front yard next to some flowers.
The two that are left are younger goldies. Probably less than half grown yet.

I fished around in there today and managed to find out where all the snails were going. At the far side of the pond where they're able to climb out, there were several dried out shells in the muck and dry dirt behind the pond, inculding the shell of the largest snail.
I collected each shell and am soaking them in hot water and antibacterial soap to keep them to show my dad. This isn't out of spite or anything, he just needs to see that even a snail couldn't withstand those conditions, and for myself I'd like to keep the shells as a sort of record on the sizes of apple snails.
However, I did fish out 10 survivors, some of which are very slow about coming out of their shells. That alone is proof of how bad it affected they were. Probably feels better in the little container of fresh water I currently have them in. I kind of want to keep them, they're sarting to charm me, but my planted tank is a big no-no for them. I do have a smaller tank, a 5-6 gallon tall hexagon that is currently being used for quarintine. Have to get them cleaned up somehow first, they look to be carrying their own load of parasites.
As for the two goldfish still in the pond, Their fate is still undecided for now. But to the looks of it, I have mom on my side about getting rid of the pond for several reasons of her own. If possible, I'll try and spare the two little lives and giv them to a store that will accept responsibility for treating them, or I'll euthanize while their still in the pond. Thanx for listening everyone.~Angela

 

[tricksterpup]

The question here, and I may sound a little rough on this, so please forgive me. Have you ever thought about taking over the maintence yourself? Do a massive water change, it may help the last 2 goldfish. Clear out the snails and do a few of the other things that need to be done,such as clean out the pump and filter.
Instead of tearing it down, talk to your mom, do some of the work, clean it up for your dad and it may be a nice present for Father's day. Get it to looking good, buy some nice plants and treat it well. My parents had a pond when I was a kid, and I did all the work in it myself. It was a pain in the Arse and I loved every minute of it.
Plus with you doing the work on it, he may be willing to let you have a bigger say with what to keep in it.
Heck, place some nice fencing around it and put some turtles in it. Or try some local fish like Gambusia or some tropicals to add some variety. You live in Florida, so you can put almost anything you want in that pond and have it breed for you.

 

[jadefoodog]

ok ima riskj sounding stupid on this one but bear with me cause i dont have a pond, but how the " word i shouldnt use" do you do a water change in a pond. remember im used to useing gravety with my gravel vaccume in my indoors tanks to do water changes

 

[Riso-chan]

He would do what he calls 'flushing' the pond, this is a process of putting a hose in the pond and filling it up until it overflows and the water in the pond runs clear.

This is also why I found several dead snails where the outflow is.
Poor things couldn't get back to water, so they just dried out. They're even trying to eat the surrounding ferns and elephant ears, and these are land plants.

BTW, I said there were 10 medium sized snails alive, well the largest one that I took for being dead was just hold up really tight in its shell, and is slowly coming back out as I write this. It has a chip in its trapdoor/operculum too. That makes it 11 snails.