Greetings everyone,
I would like to introduce myself. My name is Gordy and I am from Nebraska, just about 40 miles NW of Omaha.
I didn't start out with the intention of desiging and building a "garden pond" for Koi or other ornamental fishes.
I am a catfish fisherman and I was looking for some way to keep live bait "alive". Please don't be offended as I was not intending to use Koi fish as bait.
I use scrappy fish like river suckers, chubs, carp and bullheads for bait for catfish. I want to ensure that I am not misleading anyone on my intentions there.
What got me started here was that I tried to plan a canoe trip (sounds a bit far off from a pond excercise, I know). But, I was having difficulty getting an outfitter to line us up with 20 or more canoes for a high school reunion event. No one had that many canoes available. So, I investigated a recent FAD here... It's called "tanking". Here, you take a very large livestock watering tank and put that in the river as a sort of redneck boat and float down with the current for a leisurely trip. You can put a picnic table and six to eight adults with coolers in the larger tanks and float, and enjoy the scenery and atmosphere at a slow pace down the river.
So, I called a few places researching prices on these polyethylene tanks (some use the metal tanks, but I thought the poly tanks were better - more durable).
One tank I looked at was rectangular and about 6 ft x 9 ft x 30 inches deep. They wanted $600 for one and it would be at least six weeks to get one made. Well, I hadn't officially committed to that purchase, but the guy told me he would call me back. He did, three or four months later and he informed me that my tank was ready to be picked up! Ahhgg! He also said he had two tanks (one at a discount if I was interested). So, I now have two 1000 gallon, white, poly tanks to figure out what to do with. I decided that they were too heavy and too cumbersome to use for tanking purposes. So, I opted to utilize them for keeping fishing bait.
I have been doing my research and found lots of great information. The main thing about keeping live bait alive is the same as it is for keeping Koi happy and healthy. Therefore, I have been modeling my tank system based upon what Koi ponders are doing for their fish. Now, I am spending quite a bit of money on this project and I am having thoughts about raising Koi for my own enjoyment and for others to stock their ponds. When I was younger, I had many acquariums and raised all sorts of freshwater fish. I was really into the hobby, but kinda left it behind over the years.
I think that I have a really nice setup going so far. From the bottom of the 1,000 gallon poly tank, I have used a lake filter screen (for irrigation pumps) to siphon off the dirty water from the center of the tank and gravity feed that to the bottom of a 55 gallon poly barrel. In this barrel, the water will percolate upwards through several layers of progressively finer rock to serve as a sediment filter. At the bottom of the tank, I have a 2" drain line if I need to clean it out or dissasemble the system and relocate it. Just above the fill port at the bottom, I have a 1/2" poly platform with 7/16" holes cut in it, spaced about every 1+ inches apart. Atop that platform, I have an array of 1/2" PVC schedule 80 tubing with small holes drilled in the tubing for aeration. I will use this for purge cleaning purposes. The rock will start out with broken marble and then smaller and smaller rocks (granite gravel from river rock size on down to pea gravel). At the very top layer, I plan to use Zeolite.
The overflow from this 55 gallon tank, drops down from the top to the bottom of the second tank. The second tank is a bio-converter + aerator vessel. I am using Kaldnes K3 media (1.8 cubic feet) as the bio-media and a Gast 1/4 hp vacuum/air pump to agitate it. This didn't work very well when I first set it up. I made several design changes to the aerator before I got a good design and by that time, the Kaldnes media had absorbed some water (plastic does absorb water to an extent). Now, it rolls and boils really beautifully! I used a dark blue poly barrel for this tank to keep out any UV and other light as to not kill the Nitrosomonas and Nitrobacter bacteria. It will also be housed (enclosed) in a well insulated shelter as all of these barrels will be outside. So, it has to be insulated from the cold weather here to prevent freezing.
Just to be able to see the action, I have a really bright, industrial outdoor lamp that, when it is placed on one side of the tank at night, you can see the Kaldnes media rolling in the water through the other side of the barrel. It is circulating all the way from the bottom to the top of the barrel and constantly rolling just like the videos you might have seen on you tube for Kaldnes.
What I found worked great for aerating this bio-converter tank and agitating the Kaldnes media the best was 5/8" diameter lawn and garden soaker hose. I cut the hose into short segments and attached them to barbed fittings attached to 1/2" PVC tubing. I laid out the PVC tubing so that the soaker hose would make a circle around the perimeter of the inside of the 55 gallon barrel. The rising bubbles rolled inwards to the center at the top of the barrel and took the Kaldnes media with it, making a perfect action.
The outlet of this second tank (the bio-converter) overflows through another lake screen filter to the third tank... another 55 gallon poly barrel. In this tank, I have another array of PVC and soaker hose to aerate the water and, if needed, I can install a heater here for winter use. The recirculation water pump is located in this barrel, too. It is a PondMaster 950 pump and sucks out through yet another lake screen filter.
The outlet of the pump feeds into a 4 foot x 6 inch PVC tube. Within this tube, which stands vertically, I fabricated a drain grating that will support some pea gravel. Atop the pea gravel, I will fill the rest of the tube with activated charcoal or carbon. This will clarify the return water to the main 1,000 gallon tank just that much further.
The return water coming from the outlet of the carbon filter and directed into the 1,000 gallon tank will have two nozzles to "jet" the water into the tank from diametrically opposed corners. This will create a swirling current within the tank (I hope) and create almost a centrifugal force and direct the solid wastes and uneaten food, etc. to the center of the tank, where the drain filter will be located. From there, the water will repeat its path through the filtration system once again.
Since this system is going to be all above ground and maintained during the winter, I will be enclosing much of it with four inch thick polystyrene sheets (styrofoam insulation panels). Also, I may apply a small, 4' x 8', solar panel to heat the water during the winter (off during warm months). The volume of water and the rocks in the first filter barrel should retain some of this heat for a few hours after the sun goes down. The heat given off by the Gast vane pump should assist in this process. I want to ensure that I maintain the temperature of the whole system above 50°F all winter long (and below 74°F or so during the hot summer months).
Cooling the system during the hot months is another question. I have a few ideas, but haven't settled on what to do there yet. Something akin to a radiator or a swamp chiller comes to mind.
You see that I am spending a lot of time and expense on the bait tank here. Now, since I am doing so... I am pondering really setting up to build something truly geared to a pond, with Koi and or other exotic fish or crabs and turtles and, well, a whole mini-eco-system. Not for bait, but for a really true, fantastic garden environment. If I can raise some really hardy and beautiful fish, reptiles and amphibians and sell them, I can pay for some of my expenses to maintain my little paradise.
I have some areas here at my farm that I could really go hog wild with and make a fantastic little ecosystem.
So, I decided to check your forum out for more ideas and share mine with you. Hope I will be welcome!
Gordy (Catfishnut)
I will probably connect a PLC to this system to maintain the temperature better when I get the time to do so.
I would like to introduce myself. My name is Gordy and I am from Nebraska, just about 40 miles NW of Omaha.
I didn't start out with the intention of desiging and building a "garden pond" for Koi or other ornamental fishes.
I am a catfish fisherman and I was looking for some way to keep live bait "alive". Please don't be offended as I was not intending to use Koi fish as bait.
I use scrappy fish like river suckers, chubs, carp and bullheads for bait for catfish. I want to ensure that I am not misleading anyone on my intentions there.
What got me started here was that I tried to plan a canoe trip (sounds a bit far off from a pond excercise, I know). But, I was having difficulty getting an outfitter to line us up with 20 or more canoes for a high school reunion event. No one had that many canoes available. So, I investigated a recent FAD here... It's called "tanking". Here, you take a very large livestock watering tank and put that in the river as a sort of redneck boat and float down with the current for a leisurely trip. You can put a picnic table and six to eight adults with coolers in the larger tanks and float, and enjoy the scenery and atmosphere at a slow pace down the river.
So, I called a few places researching prices on these polyethylene tanks (some use the metal tanks, but I thought the poly tanks were better - more durable).
One tank I looked at was rectangular and about 6 ft x 9 ft x 30 inches deep. They wanted $600 for one and it would be at least six weeks to get one made. Well, I hadn't officially committed to that purchase, but the guy told me he would call me back. He did, three or four months later and he informed me that my tank was ready to be picked up! Ahhgg! He also said he had two tanks (one at a discount if I was interested). So, I now have two 1000 gallon, white, poly tanks to figure out what to do with. I decided that they were too heavy and too cumbersome to use for tanking purposes. So, I opted to utilize them for keeping fishing bait.
I have been doing my research and found lots of great information. The main thing about keeping live bait alive is the same as it is for keeping Koi happy and healthy. Therefore, I have been modeling my tank system based upon what Koi ponders are doing for their fish. Now, I am spending quite a bit of money on this project and I am having thoughts about raising Koi for my own enjoyment and for others to stock their ponds. When I was younger, I had many acquariums and raised all sorts of freshwater fish. I was really into the hobby, but kinda left it behind over the years.
I think that I have a really nice setup going so far. From the bottom of the 1,000 gallon poly tank, I have used a lake filter screen (for irrigation pumps) to siphon off the dirty water from the center of the tank and gravity feed that to the bottom of a 55 gallon poly barrel. In this barrel, the water will percolate upwards through several layers of progressively finer rock to serve as a sediment filter. At the bottom of the tank, I have a 2" drain line if I need to clean it out or dissasemble the system and relocate it. Just above the fill port at the bottom, I have a 1/2" poly platform with 7/16" holes cut in it, spaced about every 1+ inches apart. Atop that platform, I have an array of 1/2" PVC schedule 80 tubing with small holes drilled in the tubing for aeration. I will use this for purge cleaning purposes. The rock will start out with broken marble and then smaller and smaller rocks (granite gravel from river rock size on down to pea gravel). At the very top layer, I plan to use Zeolite.
The overflow from this 55 gallon tank, drops down from the top to the bottom of the second tank. The second tank is a bio-converter + aerator vessel. I am using Kaldnes K3 media (1.8 cubic feet) as the bio-media and a Gast 1/4 hp vacuum/air pump to agitate it. This didn't work very well when I first set it up. I made several design changes to the aerator before I got a good design and by that time, the Kaldnes media had absorbed some water (plastic does absorb water to an extent). Now, it rolls and boils really beautifully! I used a dark blue poly barrel for this tank to keep out any UV and other light as to not kill the Nitrosomonas and Nitrobacter bacteria. It will also be housed (enclosed) in a well insulated shelter as all of these barrels will be outside. So, it has to be insulated from the cold weather here to prevent freezing.
Just to be able to see the action, I have a really bright, industrial outdoor lamp that, when it is placed on one side of the tank at night, you can see the Kaldnes media rolling in the water through the other side of the barrel. It is circulating all the way from the bottom to the top of the barrel and constantly rolling just like the videos you might have seen on you tube for Kaldnes.
What I found worked great for aerating this bio-converter tank and agitating the Kaldnes media the best was 5/8" diameter lawn and garden soaker hose. I cut the hose into short segments and attached them to barbed fittings attached to 1/2" PVC tubing. I laid out the PVC tubing so that the soaker hose would make a circle around the perimeter of the inside of the 55 gallon barrel. The rising bubbles rolled inwards to the center at the top of the barrel and took the Kaldnes media with it, making a perfect action.
The outlet of this second tank (the bio-converter) overflows through another lake screen filter to the third tank... another 55 gallon poly barrel. In this tank, I have another array of PVC and soaker hose to aerate the water and, if needed, I can install a heater here for winter use. The recirculation water pump is located in this barrel, too. It is a PondMaster 950 pump and sucks out through yet another lake screen filter.
The outlet of the pump feeds into a 4 foot x 6 inch PVC tube. Within this tube, which stands vertically, I fabricated a drain grating that will support some pea gravel. Atop the pea gravel, I will fill the rest of the tube with activated charcoal or carbon. This will clarify the return water to the main 1,000 gallon tank just that much further.
The return water coming from the outlet of the carbon filter and directed into the 1,000 gallon tank will have two nozzles to "jet" the water into the tank from diametrically opposed corners. This will create a swirling current within the tank (I hope) and create almost a centrifugal force and direct the solid wastes and uneaten food, etc. to the center of the tank, where the drain filter will be located. From there, the water will repeat its path through the filtration system once again.
Since this system is going to be all above ground and maintained during the winter, I will be enclosing much of it with four inch thick polystyrene sheets (styrofoam insulation panels). Also, I may apply a small, 4' x 8', solar panel to heat the water during the winter (off during warm months). The volume of water and the rocks in the first filter barrel should retain some of this heat for a few hours after the sun goes down. The heat given off by the Gast vane pump should assist in this process. I want to ensure that I maintain the temperature of the whole system above 50°F all winter long (and below 74°F or so during the hot summer months).
Cooling the system during the hot months is another question. I have a few ideas, but haven't settled on what to do there yet. Something akin to a radiator or a swamp chiller comes to mind.
You see that I am spending a lot of time and expense on the bait tank here. Now, since I am doing so... I am pondering really setting up to build something truly geared to a pond, with Koi and or other exotic fish or crabs and turtles and, well, a whole mini-eco-system. Not for bait, but for a really true, fantastic garden environment. If I can raise some really hardy and beautiful fish, reptiles and amphibians and sell them, I can pay for some of my expenses to maintain my little paradise.
I have some areas here at my farm that I could really go hog wild with and make a fantastic little ecosystem.
So, I decided to check your forum out for more ideas and share mine with you. Hope I will be welcome!
Gordy (Catfishnut)
I will probably connect a PLC to this system to maintain the temperature better when I get the time to do so.
