19 replies to this topic

[Linda A]

Here she is, algae and all. The picture on the right is 2 years ago, crystal clear.

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[poodles-ponds and gardens]

Beautiful pond. I especially like the waterfall. What size pump do you have?

[Linda A]

poddles,ponds and gardens said:

Beautiful pond. I especially like the waterfall. What size pump do you have?

I believe the pump that we are presently using is 1000gpm, we had been running a 2500, and are probably going back to that one.

[poodles-ponds and gardens]

Thanks! That gives me hope that my waterfall will look the way I want. I have a 1800 gal/hr pump with a 3-4 ft. head (the pump didn't come with a chart, just a max head) so hopefully I'll end up with a good flow. I have looked at many web sites trying to balance filtration and waterfall. It can all get so confusing!

[DrDave]

Sometimes people get all caught up in the specs, types and brand names. The bottom line is: Circulation, areation and filtration. Common sense tells us not to overpopulate.

[w00005414]

I know when I put a lot of water hyacinths in my pond it helps clear things up, they really are amazing. My fish have gotten pretty big and eat the roots off of them so I bought these $15 floating circle nets from Dr. Fosters and Smith and I put the hyacinths in there and as they get larger and start multiplying I pull the smaller off shoot off and keep it in the net then throw the original larger hyacinth in the pond and let the fish have at it. I bought the initial 24 hyacinths on Ebay for probably 30 or 40 bucks and within a couple days it really helped clear up the string algae and they had already started multiplying.

[DrDave]

String algae clears itself up. The water hyacinth helps in other ways and is a great addition to any pond. The only plant I like better is water lettuce.

[Bonibelle]

I love your pond, Linda! I haven't been on here for quite a while, but I just completed a renovation to my 24 year old pond. It looks amazingly similar to yours!! When I showed my husband your picture, he just couldn't believe it. Lets see if I can post a picture of mine:


click to enlarge

[poodles-ponds and gardens]

Bonniebelle- Looks like an ideal place to relax after a hard days work!

[Bonibelle]

Thanks, my pond is my favorite place to be. I just can't get over how much it looks like Linda's. And as I look at her older picture, she has added to her pond as well. I will start another thread with before and after...

[Linda A]

Bonibelle said:

I love your pond, Linda! I haven't been on here for quite a while, but I just completed a renovation to my 24 year old pond. It looks amazingly similar to yours!! When I showed my husband your picture, he just couldn't believe it. Lets see if I can post a picture of mine:


click to enlarge

Boni, yes, your pond does look like ours! I must say, yours looks very nice.
And thank you to the person who told me to use barley extract and peroxide to get rid of the algae; it worked beautifully! We treated it a couple of times, and again right before we went away for TWO weeks. We returned to a beautiful clear pond. I'll take a picture soon and post it. We can see our fish again; we're so happy. We decided to buy one more koi, and went to our favorite place to buy them. No luck, $42 for 4" fish. No thank you, not with a heron still casing our place. Anyway, thank you again.

[Bonibelle]

Linda, you may see a barley bale floating in my pond, not sure if you can pick it out in the picture. It doesn't seem to help much though. I am not too upset with green water as long as I can control the string algae.

About your big bird;;;I purchased something called a Scare Crow that is a motion activated contraption that goes on your hose. It sprays as soon as anything moves in the area. It really works (and I actually used one in my garden to keep the deer out too). I have raccoons that have caused me some problems lately. They actually pulled my lights out of my waterfall!! So I need to hook up the Scare Crow again. The problem is that it will also spray the song birds getting a drink and neighbors who come to see my project when I'm not home!!

I can't wait to see your new picture!

Boni

[Linda A]

We have a scare crow, and yes, it does work. Especially when I forget that it is on. By the way, the liquid barley extract worked VERY well. I can see my fish clearly now.

[DrDave]

Egrets and raccoons ignored mine. We must have smarter predators in So Cal.
Rifle works great! They never come back.

[koiguy1969]

shoot now ..ask questions later (if you need a recipe) lol