Am I jumping the gun? Cleaning & opening pond

[Pugwinkle]

It is going to be a really nice week here in Ontario Canada (between 50 and 60 degrees F) and I am itching to clean and open my small preformed pond we have on the property. I won't be putting any fish or turtles in the pond until the weather gets much warmer but I'd love to get the grunt work done by cleaning out the pond and starting up the pump, filter and waterfall. However, there is always the chance that we will get temperatures that will be below freezing yet this month so am I jumping the gun or do you think I could go ahead with my plans to clean it and get it up and running? I am under the impression that as long as the water has movement (the waterfall) it won't freeze.

Any thoughts on this would be greatly appreciated.

 

[oldmarine]

Hi Pugwinkle,

It wouldn't hurt to get things cleaned up, and filters running. If you have a chance of a hard freeze, I wouldn't start the water fall just yet. Only you could be the judge of that. Now if you get a little frost at night now and again like we have been getting this last week, then you won't have any problems with your water fall freezing over and damaging things.

I kept my pond filter running all winter, because a I had a heater in the pond. The pond water never dropped below 32*F throughout the whole winter. The only minor problem that creates is evaporation.

Happy ponding,

 

[koiguy1969]

with no live inhabitatants theres no reason to wait to clean it up...

 

[DrDave]

I agree, no time like the present to get it cleaned up.