Inherited Pond with House - Come Looking for Help

[Nekosohana]

Hi all,

Before I go and drop what will likely be some insane money on getting this back up and fixed. I inhereted a lovely pond with the purchase of my home.

I am being honest, I am not a "daily chores" person and really feel like when I bought it, I was enamored with the idea. Now I have a responsibility to my little fish friends here to keep the pond clean.

Last year I had almost no problems, spring brought on a lot of algae which I cleaned out by hand. With fall, the leaves (and the pecans from the tree) came, and I can't clean them out fast enough. I had the trees cut back recently to help against this.

Before I have someone come and charge me a ton of money, it was working well before and I'm not above the labor, if I knew what I was supposed to do.

How would I go about attacking a murky pond before the weather heats up too much?

Edit:. I'm searching the forums now. I think what I'm really looking for is a good primer more than anything else. Apparently this pond has a bog, but I don't know how or why. Is that the rocks, can I add more rocks to the waterfall, can I just dump a bucket of that sludge eater stuff in there? Etc etc.

 

[Nekosohana]

Think I messed up my first post. If this is duplicate, please delete.

I'm in the Southern US and looking to solve a few problems with my pond that I inhereted with my home purchase. Really more just understand what I've gotten into.

For now, I'm going to read up and see what I can learn, but here are some pics in the interim of current state while I research how to clean it up.

 

[GBBUDD]

Looks like your off to a better start with your new pond then most who come in here. you have a skimmer thumbs up. And if you have a skimmer do you have a biofalls? is there another plastic hosing at the water fall area? The irises obviously are loving it . This time of year is a bad time to figure out how your pond is doing as there is little new growth with your plants.

WELCOME

 

[Nekosohana]

Thank you! I'll look up biofalls. I don't know that one yet.

 

[addy1]

Welcome to our forum! Very nice looking pond.

What kind of bog? I filter with only a bog.

 

[j.w]

@Nekosohana
Pretty nice looking pond there.
I'm not seeing any bog but maybe you just didn't show it. Do you have some kind of a filter pump somewhere?

 

[mrsclem]

Lots of great people to help you out. Please do read as much as you can here as well as other sites. You mentioned adding sludge eater stuff- don't start dumping chemicals into your pond! It doesn't look too bad and with a little work you will have a beautiful pond!

 

[GBBUDD]

i would lean toward the pile of iris as where your bog might be but the term bog is pretty broad. i have three bogs one is a aquablocks bog. the second is peastone bog both are up flow and a third more natural bog for plants pitcher plants to be exact. a up flow through gravel is what is the most common term for a bog is

 

[Phaewryn]

Well, if that one white filter pad in the skimmer is the only filter media, that's a problem. Does the water flow up and out into the pond from the bog area in addition to from the waterfall? Is there a bio filter or any filter media in the waterfall box? Lift up the rock over where the fall starts and take a pic in there so we can see how big that is and what's in it. How many gph is your pump? How many gallons is the pond? If you don't know, tell us how deep it is and the measurements and we can estimate. Now would be the time to start sourcing more plants to plant in it. Some plants in the pool below the waterfall would help filter some more, and the more plants you have the clearer the water, but I suspect you might have a filter in the waterfall box (and if not, you can add filter pads and bio media and make it into one). Resist the temptation to dump chemicals in there, but you could add some activated carbon made for ponds or aquariums (in a media bag) to the waterfall box or skimmer box to help if you really want to dump something in there immediately. This will remove the tannins from the pecans and leaves. You want to place it where the water flows over and through it, so in the waterfall box is ideal.