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You can visit a makeshift “koi pond” in Bed-Stuy right now

Written by Site Adminstrator on . Posted in Blog.

You can visit a makeshift

New Yorkers pride themselves on their resourcefulness but, even by our standards, creating a miniature aquarium from a leaky fire hydrant sounds high-key insane. 

Yet, that’s exactly what’s been happening for the past week in a corner of Bed-Stuy and it’s taken TikTok and other social platforms by storm.  

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If you’re not familiar with the Bed-Stuy koi pond, let me catch you up: a leaky hydrant flooded a patch of dirt in the Brooklyn neighborhood and a resident filled the puddle with several dozen small goldfish. The neighbors teamed up to take care of the fish but, at some point last week, the fire department warned residents that they needed to take the fish out and shut off the hydrant.

Although the neighbors temporarily removed the animals, they placed them back once the fire department left. Now, there’s a warning sign above the hydrant: “PLEASE!!!” it reads. “DO NOT TOUCH OR TAKE OUR FISH. IT’S FOR OBSERVATION ONLY! YOU’RE BEING WATCHED.” Another recent video shows that red mood lighting was recently installed into the “pond.”

The Bed-Stuy koi pond is located at the intersection of Tompkins Avenue and Hancock Street, right next to the beloved soul food restaurant Peaches Hot House. It’s become somewhat of a pilgrimage site for locals and videos abound with mixed, but passionate, comments. 

“Only in bk,” reads a comment on TikTok. 

“This is becoming the eighth wonders of NYC,” someone else wrote.

Some comments showed concern for the fish. 

“Cats and rats might steal the fish,” one person noted. 

“What’s gonna happen when it gets cold out,” someone else wondered. 

If you want to check out the Bed-Stuy koi pond, make sure you try and get there as soon as possible—there’s no knowing when the fish will be removed for good.

Whatever your thoughts are on the so-called koi pond, you have to admit there’s something so fundamentally New York about this whole situation that you can’t help but love it all, even if it’s just a little bit. 

* This article was originally published here