My pond runs all winter, zone 2/3

[callingcolleen1]

We have a nice two day "reprieve" from the "deep freezer" weather, supposed to get close to above freezing and maybe melt some of the ice today! Right now we are warming up nice at minus 6 Celsius {21 Fahrenheit} and that is warmer than it has been for the last couple weeks so I will be very happy with that! Right now the birds are singing and the puppies are running in and out of the house all morning! Won't tell the puppies that it is going back to VERY CoLd again by Friday!!!

 

[callingcolleen1]

Cleaned out the one filter, two more big filters to do before the deep freeze comes back Friday night. The bath tub is a big mess now, and there is still lots of ice on the pond, should melt mostly by tomorrow cause it will be warmer and I will leave heater on to melt ice quicker so I can get in and clean the other two filters. Normally by now the weather is nice, and I would have cleaned them by now, but this year is so much colder than last year. The filters were not to dirty, but they needed to be clean because the smear algae grows so good under the ice and those big filters suck it all up, but the algae is buoyant and then the filter starts to float to the surface and then when it gets really cold, the top half of the filter can freeze hard and then the flow to the top pond will slow down.

 

[callingcolleen1]

Today pond paths are powered and pack with several fresh inches of powered snow. All is good, connecting ponds all flowing together nicely with no problems. I think the real hard cold may be gone for good now, should be getting really warm in next two days I here, and spring is just 15 days away now....

 

[j.w]

Crunch, crunch, crunch every time you take a step...................brrrrrrrrrrrrrr, it looks cold to me still and it is 52f here right now and I'm chilly and gonna make a fire in the stove

 

[callingcolleen1]

it is strange how the snow gets louder as the temperature gets colder. I know it is the ice crystals in the snow are rubbing together thus making the noise. When the temperature is warm like today, currently about 40 degrees Fahrenheit, or plus five Celsius, the snow makes no noise hardly, except the wind is howling now...

 

[j.w]

You have lots of noisy nature at your place Colleen.................poke your head out there and tell them to keep it down

We have noisy woodpeckers right now rapping loudly on our gutters waking us up at dawn now. They do this every year right before Spring. Think they are calling for a mate.............whoever is loudest and longer wins the girl!

 

[morewater]

I got an e-mail from a client (I saw their property once last Fall for a pump repair / aerator placement). Her e-mail stated that her boulder fountain stopped working, when I asked her why it was even working, she said her husband said that the pump should run all winter. So, despite detailed instructions (unplug the submersible and only leave the aerator running), people will do what they will and what they think makes sense.

I find that the more expensive the lesson, the easier it is learned.

As far as birds go, jw, the noisiest around here is definitely the Blue Jay and the most annoying is the Mourning Dove (they're monotonous).

 

[callingcolleen1]

I like to run my pump all winter as I set my pond up much differently than most. My pumps have been running for well over 22 years now, I never shut them off, but I do not have the typical pond setup. Lots of people have the usual setup, skimmer, external filter, neither will winter well at extreme temperatures. My pumps are all under the water, and double big pre-pump filter that will run good all winter. I also do not have a big splashing waterfall, as they can be a problem sometimes too. My method is simple and works well at keeping the very big koi in the top pond alive and well now as the two biggest Koi are over 20 years old as well.

If you are planning to winter your pond run it all winter, and you are not sure about running your ponds, you should ask lots of questions and see if running your pumps all winter will work for you.

My neighborhood is very noisy some days, the traffic, people, and then the new dogs two doors down like to help my dogs bark more....

 

[morewater]

Yeah, but I think the problem there was a power failure during our December ice storm. The water lines must have froze, then when the power came back on, the pump most likely overheated and tripped thermally. Now it's just going to have to wait to thaw. That's why I like to run aerators as well. I figure all those little bubbles gotta go somewhere.

Spring is never going to come. It's like Nuclear Winter.

 

[j.w]

Hey maybe a nuclear winter under your pond if those bubbles all build up and pressure builds and fish sitting on your roof

 

[callingcolleen1]

Morewater, remember the fat groundhog said you would have winter for two extra weeks, so spring should come for you. just a little later than normal... Power outages really suck in the middle of the winter, and I feel bad for you down there, seems like you guys get crazy ice storms of Biblical proportion! Do you have a hole open in the ice yet? Hoping spring comes for you too

I topped up my bottom pond and that got rid of the ice pretty quick, this video from yesterday afternoon, and since then the ice has really melted and now my pond is almost ice free this morning. Topping up the pond to the level of the ice when weather is warm, really helps to get rid of ice very fast before it cracks and falls on the fish.

 

[morewater]

Nope, still a wasteland out there. There's a dinky hole in the ice. I might send a small jig down there to see if the fish are biting. Supposed to be +5C for a couple days, but then back down to the minuses. I'm gonna get me a groundhog license real soon.

 

[callingcolleen1]

Not to brag or anything... but we are supposed to get to a high of plus 16 C!! Today will be the warmest day of the year!

Trouble is the big snow pile in the parking lot two doors down is melting so fast and flowing this way, and the ground down deep is still frozen so it is not draining. The next door neighbors yard from the view of my back deck this morning.

If you look down two yards you can see the tip of the big white snow pile. Great! Now I have water front property off my back deck!!

 

[morewater]

Wow, that's a lot of melt, Colleen.

You should consider putting in what's called a dry well to drain some of that melt off.

I completed one for a client last year who has had problems with residual melt water.

It was comprised of digging a large hole (I used a small backhoe) about 5x5x5', with two adjoining trenches of the same depth radiating out from the main hole by approximately 20'. Of course, this was for a large area, it can be scaled back to suit the area that's affected.

Vertical 4" ABS pipe with grate covers extend to the bottom of the hole, where they join a "T" that is connected to weeping tile (hose), that extends into the trenches. The main hole, and the trenches, are then filled with clear stone for 12", and then the excavated soil is put back into the trenches, the area is then seeded.

No mechanicals, no pumps, just a means for the surface water to seep back into the ground and then be dissipated into the ground water once more.

Fairly cheap project, assuming that you do it yourself. The main "well", and then adjoining lines need to be below the frost line, which is typically about 4'.

Another means, albeit mechanical, is to sink a sump pump well into the ground at the lowest point in the yard and put a removable grate over the top of it. When you run into that type of a runoff, you can remove the grate and put a submersible utility pump into the sump pump well, attach it to a hose and pump it off down the street to the nearest drain. Using this method requires that you also purchase (with the sump pump well), a watertight lid to prevent water entering the well during the Fall, which will freeze and render the sump pump well inaccessible to the utility pump come Spring.

Both are fairly cheap, and very effective ways of dealing with Spring melt, or with heavy deluges of rain. Both alternatives are a lot cheaper than foundation damage.

 

[callingcolleen1]

Thanks Morewater, but That's not my problem, that is the house next door and my yard is higher up slightly. The trouble right now is the ground is still frozen solid and lots is not draining away, plus the soil down here is heavy clay too. That lake next door would not even be here, because it is coming from that pile of snow from the parking lot, two houses down. The pile is massive, it is almost as high as some small houses, then it all drains down to the alley and the neighbors yard. The company at the end of the block is supposed to have that massive pile of snow removed BEFORE it melts, which has not happened this year, so neighbors are going to complain up a storm. My yard is mucky every year cause of the heavy clay, but I have been putting path ways all around the yard to counter this.