Preferred pumps for a small pond?

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Hello,

I am a relatively new ponder. We moved into a home almost 2 years ago with an existing pond, well really more of a fountain. After much trial and error I have got it up and functioning. We've really enjoyed it and have a small colony (okay, only 8) of feeder goldfish that have survived for well over a year now and we would like to make the pond deeper as it is much too shallow for both them and the plants at this point.

Once we get past the actual building project, we will need to install a much more capable filtration system. Right now I have a Total Pond pump with a ghetto-tastic mechanical filter that does about (according to the manufacturer anyway) 330 gph. By my calculations, the new pond will be about 800-900 gallons. I plan on building a skippy-type system.

After reading a few other threads here, I am thinking of buying a fairly powerful pump, and then splitting the line, one side into the skippy and the other up and onto the rock which creates a waterfall... Is this realistic? The line would have to travel upwards about 4-5 vertical feet to get to the top of the waterfall rock from the pump.

Any thoughts or experiences on specific brands and models of small/medium-sized pumps? Ideally it'd be somethign I could pick up at Home Depot or Lowes, but I'm also willing to get something online or in a pond shop if it really makes a difference. I've already read some reviews the HD website and they mostly say each pump is useless! Eeek. FWIW my little Total Pond pump has done a pretty good job, if I dont hear back from anyone I'll probably just stick with that brand...

Thanks in advance!
 
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Most people put the waterfall in front of the filter container and outflow the filter to the top of the waterfall. A major reason people build waterfalls is to hide the filter.
 
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Shakaho, thanks for the reply. I understand what you are saying, and yes the waterfall will "hide" the skippy. However logistically its not an option to have the skippy directly as output for the waterfall. The existing waterfall element is a rock face that rises out of the pond about 5 feet tall. So there's no way to make that work unless the water pumping into the skippy was also traveling upwards of 3-5 feet depending where we placed it in the pond. I dont think that would be very efficent.

Another question--after discussion my BF and I htought that maybe we just purchase another pump, keep our existing pump for the waterfall, and use the second pump just for the skippy. Anyone else do something similar?
 
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Sure you could use one pump and split it or use two pumps. The advantage to two pumps is that if one fails, the other will continue to circulate the water and buy you some time to replace the broken pump. The downside to two pumps is that they will likely use more electricity that one pump moving the same amount of water. I have one pump that I actually use to run to 3 different "features". In general, you want to turn your pond over at least once per hour. So with an 800 gph pond you will want an 800 gph pump, minimum. Keep in mind, with the vertical rise the pump must work against, it will actually push less than 800 gallons, so shoot for more like 1200 minimum. I am very pleased with the 1300 gph pump with built in UV sterilizer that I got from Lowe's. My pond is actually closer to 1600 gallons so by my own advice i not running enough pump but my pond does stay clear.
 
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I run two pumps, one for the waterfall and one for the filter, both are Pondmaster.......knock on wood, I've had them for years! Kim
 

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