Good morning! Just doing a little update, here. We talked with my Dad and decided it will be good for him to have a small to medium pond with a waterfall filter (pads and bio balls) and a small intake bay. He can scoop debris out of the intake bay and other more complicated maintenance can be done by visiting family - once or twice a year. (Like cleaning out the filter falls.) We are planning to give him a drain out the bottom of the filter falls, so he can do like I do - and periodically let gunk settle to the bottom and drain out into the garden. This has worked well for my pond out front. Super easy - just turn off the pump, let things settle, then open the gate valve. Close and re-start -- easy peasy!
I was very pleased with the customer service from Webb's Online/Universal Ponds. I put a bunch of stuff in my shopping cart and then called. A guy listened to my request for a consultation about equipment and then said he would have a man named Joe call me back. Joe was really great! He pointed out some areas where I could make things easier (instead of this check valve assembly, which we would have to adapt to the tubing we are using -- use this one, which comes with all the adapters.) He figured out all the plumbing parts I would need. He asked lots of questions and walked through the whole thing. He said to give him a day, during which time he would add a couple of parts to the cart and carefully check through everything again. He called me the next day and went over things again -- AND he had managed to get me a small discount. I ordered everything -- so I guess this will really happen!!!!!!!