I have had good success with wooden houses on the edge of my pond that are mounted to trees. I wrap 2 foot sections of black stove pipe that has been opened up around the tree as a coon guard and that has worked well. I have tried to put them over the water on posts, but they are much harder to service and maintain there. 1 1/2” PVC over a fence post works well, but if you drive the post in more than a couple of feet, it can be very difficult to get it out, especially if the weight of the house has leaned it over a bit. I have used the threaded galvanized posts too. If you put a coupler over the threaded end when you pound them in, it will help protect the threads. CC, if you don’t have trees on the edge of your pond to mount a house to, another alternative would be to put a 4” treated post in the ground on shore with a coon guard to avoid the hassle of fooling with the posts in the water. I have used 1 1/2” PVC over fence posts for bluebird houses and have had no coon or snake problems, but I don’t know if that system would be strong enough on solid ground to work. As mentioned above, when I hung the heavier wood duck houses on that system in the water they tended to lean in a year or two. Make sure to mount the houses to the post and not the PVC or else the house and PVC will rotate on the post. Good luck, I hope they take up residence with you, they are really cool to watch.
